Travel and expense platform Emburse during the past three years has been on a hot acquisition streak, this year adding reshopping and sourcing technology provider Tripbam—a perennial favorite at BTN's Innovate technology faceoff—to its suite of offerings.
Like its acquisition of mobile travel integrator Roadmap the year prior, Emburse's acquisition of Tripbam was part of its vision that "can help us achieve that goal of the expense report going away" said CEO Eric Friedrichsen, a former SAP Concur executive and corporate software industry veteran who joined the company in 2020, after Emburse formed from the merger of Certify and Chrome River.
Emburse still is in the process of incorporating "a lot of opportunities for integration between Tripbam and the rest of the Emburse platform," Friedrichsen said. One was demonstrated at BTN's Innovate this year, with Tripbam's reshopping offers integrated into the Emburse Go—the former Roadmap—app. Having the offers within the app instead of by email has bumped up the acceptance rate, he said. Messaging capabilities also can provide reminders, such as that breakfast or parking is included.
The acquisition has been particularly beneficial to joint customers of both technologies, such as ExxonMobil and Elevance Health, which use both Tripbam and Emburse's expense solution, and Microsoft and Nike, which use both Tripbam and Emburse Go, he added.
Emburse had its eye on more than just the technology itself and the customers with the acquisition, however.
"The travel experience their team brings to the table is incredible," Friedrichsen said. "Emburse Go has interfaces with various TMCs and booking tools, and so does Tripbam, so we're working more and more in centralizing the way we interact with TMC partners, OBT partners and other travel data providers."
As a whole, Emburse has been on a rapid growth path in recent years, with annual revenue increasing from $115 million to more than $250 million in that period. More acquisitions are certainly in its future, although there is currently "nothing in the hopper," according to Friedrichsen.