Former Alibaba exec invests $3 mln in Vietnamese start-up app

John Wu, a former leader of China’s largest e-commerce company Alibaba, has pledged to invest nearly $3 million in Vntrip.vn, a Vietnamese start-up project involved in online hotel booking.

Alibaba’s former chief technical officer and his investor group plan to help the Vietnamese online travel agency to improve customer services .

Vntrip’s CEO and founder Le Dac Lam told VnExpress that the investment came during the first round of fundraising, and John Wu’s investor group has agreed to cooperate with them.

Vntrip is a start-up project  that provides online hotel booking services. Photo from Vntrip.vn

“The financing will be used to serve the expansion of Vntrip.vn, starting with offering free shuttle services from airports for customers who book through the platform. Another part of the money will be used to provide discounts and free accommodation for loyal customers,” the start-up company said.

Lam added: “After the first fundraising round, we will continue to invest in customer services and marketing campaigns.”

Established at the end of 2014, Vntrip.vn has developed into one of Vietnam’s largest online hotel booking networks through its partnership with Booking.com, a unit of America’s Priceline Group and one of the world’s largest hotel booking services with capitalization of more than $65 billion.

John Wu’s F&H fund evaluates Vntrip.vn as being worth nearly VND300 billion ($13.48 million). Currently, Vntrip.vn’s system can connect real-time to more than 6,000 hotels in Vietnam and nearly 900,000 international hotels.

The application is also the first Vietnamese Over-the-Air programming (OTA) start-up to support mobile users with Android and iOS platforms besides real-time payments through websites.

John Wu, Alibaba’s chief technology officer for nearly 10 years, was named “China Angel Investor of the Year” in 2014 by the Chinese edition of Entrepreneur. He has nearly 20 year experience in technical skills and management.