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Image credit: Gaiyo

Almere, The Netherlands-based mobility startup Innovactory, the company behind the transport app Gaiyo, announced on Tuesday that it has raised €1.5M in a fresh round of funding led by Horizon Flevoland and other investors.

Eric Bos Waaldijk, senior investment manager at Horizon Flevoland, says, “Innovactory has an appealing vision of mobility and a strong team. We all know that a more sensible and smarter approach to mobility is necessary for many reasons. By making all forms of transportation accessible in a very simple way, Innovactory helps the traveller to travel smart, fast, and sustainable.”

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Capital utilisation

The company claims that the raised capital will help it to further develop its product, connect more transport providers, and increase the number of users of the app.

Innovactory’s CEO Lucien Groenhuijzen says, “The new capital will be used to expand services in the Netherlands and abroad. The goal is to give more people access to sustainable mobility services. We are happy with Horizon as an investor because they will use their knowledge and network to help us find real solutions, without taking the place of the entrepreneur.”

“One app for all your transport”

Launched in 2020 by Innovactory, Gaiyo is a Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) app that functions as a personal travel assistant. It provides a real-time overview of all available travel options and combinations, complete with departure and arrival times, travel time, and costs.

Options range from train, tram and bus to shared transport. The app also shows the available times of connecting public transport and is available free for Android and iOS users. 

Currently, there are many parking apps on offer in the Netherlands including Amber, ConnectCar, Greenwheels, MyWheels, and Sixt Share, among others. However, the differences in price and service offered have been small so far. And this is where Gaiyo is making a difference. 

The company claims to provide the cheapest parking app in the Netherlands. It does not charge transaction or subscription fees for parking actions and offers useful additional transport functions. The all-in-one transport app lets users plan their route, provide a traffic jam overview, helps buy a train ticket via the app or even book a shared transport.

In October 2021, Gaiyo partnered with Berlin-based micro-mobility company TIER Mobility. The parties claimed that for both of them, the integration was an important step in the full development of Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS).