Danish AI startup BeCause advances tourism sustainability practices from angel investors

BeCause, the trailblazing startup transforming how the hospitality, travel, and tourism industries manage their sustainability data, has announced a significant early investment from renowned Danish entrepreneurs-turned-investors Carsten Mahler and Daniel Heskia. The $450,000 investment provides important financial backing for the Danish company's next phase and brings valuable strategic guidance and advice from seasoned investors known for identifying successful enterprises and generating significant returns.

The startup's AI-powered sustainability hub simplifies, speeds up, and reduces costs for sustainability management in the tourism industry, freeing up resources and allowing for greater real-world impact. By eliminating 60% of the resources previously used for repetitive, error-prone manual administrative tasks, BeCause enables stakeholders to stay up to date with the latest sustainability improvements, resulting in a sixfold faster return on sustainability investments. This improvement ultimately leads to a significant increase in bottom-line profits, potentially amounting to millions of dollars for a typical hotel chain in the first year alone.

Frederik Rubens Steensgaard, CEO and Co-founder, BeCause: "Since our founding, we've already attracted some of the world's leading travel and tourism brands, including Booking.com, GreenKey, and other leading travel and tourism companies, all of whom believe in our platform's ability to transform their approach to sustainability and are committed to providing sustainable options to travelers while improving how their companies manage their sustainability efforts more efficiently."

The investment, secured ahead of the startup's official seed round opening, enables BeCause to expand its commercial and product development efforts with added resources and runway.

"Ineffective sustainability management is costing hotel and travel brands over $8 billion each year, in addition to missed revenues of at least $13 billion annually based on our industry estimations," added Steensgaard. "This early investment addresses a significant need in the industry and helps support our mission of making sustainability management simpler, faster and cheaper so that tourism companies can make a tangible impact on people, the planet and their profits."

BeCause is also participating in the Alchemist Accelerator, a global top-ten incubator for enterprise software startups whose Demo Day, scheduled for May 30, has historically attracted more than 400 investors seeking high-impact opportunities.

Investors Mahler and Heskia have a track record of founding successful companies, including FundConnect, which before its acquisition, provided data management and reporting solutions for the financial sector and is now Europe's preferred neutral fund data infrastructure. The investors' success with FundConnect, which manages financial data similarly to how BeCause handles sustainability data, highlights their expertise in creating and scaling digital ecosystems. It also points to the potential of future applications for BeCause's sustainability data solutions beyond the travel and tourism sector. 

The investment also comes at a time when the market for sustainability data solutions is maturing. Over the last 24 months, regulations and supply chain pressures have spurred demand for the solutions BeCause has developed – AI-enabled automation and streamlining of sustainability data and workflows across multiple stakeholders.

The startup's technology framework connects certification entities such as Green Key and travel providers and distributors, enabling over 10,000 hotels and OTAs (Online Travel Agencies) to provide travelers with accurate and reliable sustainability data. These processes, traditionally handled via spreadsheets, emails and unconnected niche systems, are ripe for transformation, and the need to manage them efficiently to ensure compliance and competitive advantage is fueling BeCause's growth.

Carsten Mahler, former CEO of FundConnect and Danske Invest:  "We see the potential impact of BeCause's sustainability data management hub can have on businesses, and we believe in their unique approach to applying these principles to sustainability. We are excited to join Frederik and his team on this journey and provide guidance and support to help them achieve their profit with a purpose-driven goal. We have been impressed by the team."

The investment was made through Prolab Holding, an entity held by Mahler and Heskia. Other investors in BeCause include Innovation Fund Denmark, Alchemist Accelerator, the Copenhagen School of Entrepreneurship, Vækstfonden, and Corde Invest.

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