Trip Ninja: Helping OTAs and TMCs create multi-city itineraries that suit everyone's wallets

In the summer of 2014 as friends and I planned a trip to Europe, we quickly realized that to visit five cities and find the best deal, we would have to analyze hundreds of flights! We came up with Trip Ninja as a way to increase travel search efficiency. Through trial and error and 4+ years of tackling this complex problem, we have developed technology that uses machine learning to find cheaper fares for multi-city trips. We partner with online travel agencies (OTAs) and travel management companies (TMCs) to identify markup opportunities for multi-city trips, while also providing the traveler with savings.

We launched the company formally two and a half years ago and today Trip Ninja is a team of ten people headquartered in Halifax, Nova Scotia, with team members in Ottawa, Seattle, and Calgary. I am happy to share that we went live with our first online travel agency at the end of 2018 and are now live in metasearch globally. Through our partners, we have facilitated multi-city trips to more than 140+ countries, helping over 25,000 travelers explore the world. 

We also participated in the Travel Forward Startup Showcase and Competition, sponsored by Amadeus, where Trip Ninja was shortlisted as one of the top startups to present to a panel of judges and then voted by the audience as the winner. We got to share the stage and present to dozens of travel industry leaders, which was certainly a memorable moment to receive the validation and support for our company and the product we have built. As CEO of the company, it makes me look back and acknowledge the support we have received from various organizations, one of the most important ones being Amadeus for Startups .

We started working with Amadeus for Startups about two years ago and the team really helped us kick-start development with minimal upfront cost. We were very much in the sandbox building stage when we met Amadeus and we got a significant boost from the partnership. We discussed what we were trying to do in our business and the Amadeus team offered and recommended different pieces of technology that would work well. It was extremely beneficial to get that in-house expertise that can connect you to the right resources. 

Now that we are past the product development stage, Amadeus helps us work with our OTA partners to create the kinds of contracts that makes sense for all three parties involved. The Amadeus team is extremely responsive: helping us network at conferences, responding to emails within minutes and giving us advice on business points. The best thing about the partnership is that we can take advantage of the Amadeus ecosystem and choose what elements we require per our business needs. It's been a great journey so far and we are looking to celebrate many more milestones together.