Room 77

01 / WHAT IT BUILT

What the company did

Room 77 was a hotel metasearch site founded in 2010 by Brad Gerstner. Its signature feature showed travelers floor plans of hotels and, in some cases, photos of individual rooms, and later a virtual Room View simulating the view from a room's window. Travelers could compare prices for the same property across Expedia, Priceline, Booking.com and other booking sites. After pivots into mobile check-in via its CheckMate subsidiary and a 2014 technology licensing deal with Google, Room 77 was acquired by travel startup Lola in 2016 and then by HotelPlanner in 2019.

03 / EVENT HISTORY

Events in the structured record

1. 2010
   Company founded

   Brad Gerstner founds Room 77 as a hotel metasearch site showing travelers hotel floor plans and individual room details.

2. 2013
   Funding and acquisition

   Room 77 raises $30 million from Expedia and other investors, acquires mobile hotel check-in service CheckMate, and hires former Jetsetter CEO Drew Patterson as CEO.

3. 2014
   Google licensing deal

   Google licenses Room 77's hotel-booking software; co-founder and CTO Calvin Yang and many engineers join Google, while Room 77 distributes tens of millions in excess cash to investors and keeps its brand and patents.

4. 2016
   Acquisition

   Travel startup Lola, founded by Kayak co-founder Paul English, acquires Room 77 for its hotel search technology.

5. 2019
   Acquisition

   HotelPlanner announces its acquisition of Room 77 to grow bookings and revenue in the global group hotel market.