FUNNOW’s $10 million strategic investment from Hotai Motor and integration with chicTrip highlight a broader shift toward connecting AI-powered travel discovery with live local booking inventory.
Artificial intelligence is changing how travelers discover and organize trips, but the next stage of travel technology may be less about generating itineraries and more about executing them. Agoda’s 2026 Travel Outlook found that 63% of surveyed Asian travelers were likely to use AI to plan their next trip, with local attraction recommendations, translations and personalized travel plans among the leading use cases. Among South Korean travelers, 62% said they were likely to use AI for their next trip.
The technology is also moving closer to transactions. In August, Google expanded AI Mode in Search with capabilities to compare travel options, track flight prices and book hotels within an AI-assisted experience. That creates a new competitive question for travel platforms: Can AI move beyond recommending what travelers should do and actually connect those recommendations to available, bookable services? FUNNOW Group’s latest strategic partnership with Taiwan’s Hotai Motor provides one example of how companies are approaching that transition.
From Travel Planning to Bookable Experiences
On September 23, FUNNOW announced a US$10 million strategic investment from Hotai Motor, giving the Taiwanese automotive company an approximately 10% stake in FUNNOW. The Series C investment will support FUNNOW’s international expansion, AI development and preparations for an initial public offering. The transaction also establishes a broader partnership between FUNNOW and Hotai’s travel-planning platform, chicTrip.
The first integration will focus on Japan, with FUNNOW’s booking inventory incorporated into chicTrip. The companies plan to subsequently expand coverage to Taiwan and Southeast Asia. The distinction between the two platforms is important. chicTrip is built around destination discovery and intelligent itinerary planning, while FUNNOW provides access to real-time bookings across restaurants, accommodations, entertainment and lifestyle experiences.
Together, the model is moving toward:
Travel inspiration → AI itinerary planning → live inventory → reservation and payment.
Hotai says chicTrip had more than 2.9 million members by September 2026. The platform launched its Japan version in June with AI route planning, collaborative itinerary editing and mobility services.
Japan is a logical starting point because of the depth of cross-border travel between Taiwan and Japan. Taiwanese travelers made more than 4.67 million trips to Japan during the first seven months of 2026, according to figures cited in the announcement, representing a 20.85% year-over-year increase.
Japan is also a major destination for travelers from South Korea. Korean outbound travelers made 5.675 million trips to Japan during the first half of 2026, up 18.6% year over year, with Japan accounting for 37.9% of all Korean outbound travel during the period. That makes Japan more than a convenient launch market. It is a high-volume environment in which the ability to connect trip planning with restaurants, activities and other local services can be tested at scale.
The Travel Platform Is Becoming an Infrastructure Layer
FUNNOW’s strategy also reflects a broader change in how travel platforms are being positioned. The company operates across seven markets: Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines and Japan. Its portfolio includes FunNow, Eatigo and Niceday. Rather than building this regional footprint entirely organically, FUNNOW has expanded through acquisitions, including Malaysia’s TABLEAPP in 2020, Taiwan’s Niceday in 2021 and Southeast Asian restaurant-booking platform Eatigo in 2023. It also brought KKday in as a Series B investor.
The latest strategy is not simply to add more countries. FUNNOW said it is shifting toward a “B2AI2C” model in which its booking infrastructure can power strategic partners and AI interfaces.
That is significant because AI may increasingly become the interface through which travel decisions are made. If that happens, the value could shift toward platforms capable of supplying reliable, real-time inventory behind those interfaces.
While conversing with KoreaTechToday, a FUNNOW spokesperson said the company’s immediate strategy is to deepen its existing markets rather than pursue new geographic expansion.
“We currently have no immediate plans to enter entirely new geographical markets; our primary focus is expanding our market share in existing regions. Over the past two years, we prioritized Southeast Asia and saw strong momentum, particularly in Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand. We began establishing our footprint in Japan back in 2019, building a solid supply-side foundation. With the chicTrip partnership, we expect Japan to become our third core growth pillar, alongside our home market of Taiwan and Southeast Asia.”
That strategy puts the Hotai partnership into a different context. The investment is not simply financing another geographic push. It is also about increasing the depth of transactions within markets where FUNNOW already has supply.
For Hotai, the rationale is similarly broader than travel. The company has been expanding its Mobility-as-a-Service ecosystem, with chicTrip extending that strategy from transportation into travel and lifestyle services. The partnership gives Hotai access to FUNNOW’s regional booking network while giving chicTrip additional local inventory.
The IPO Adds Another Layer
The partnership comes as FUNNOW prepares for the public markets. The company entered IPO counseling with Taishin Securities on July 23, 2026.
The investment also follows a regional expansion strategy built around M&A and strategic capital, with FUNNOW positioning international scale and network effects as important to competing across Asia.
The bigger technology question, however, extends beyond FUNNOW. As Google and major travel platforms increasingly connect AI interfaces to transactions, itinerary generation alone is becoming less differentiated. The harder problem is maintaining accurate availability, completing reservations, handling payments and connecting digital recommendations with fragmented local businesses. That means the next generation of AI travel platforms may be judged not only by how intelligently they plan a trip, but by how effectively they execute it.
From AI Recommendations to Real-World Transactions
The FUNNOW-chicTrip partnership illustrates where travel technology could be heading: AI becomes the planning layer, while booking platforms provide the commercial infrastructure underneath it. For travelers, that could reduce the distance between deciding what to do and actually doing it. For travel companies, it creates a new battle around inventory, integrations, transaction infrastructure and access to local merchants.
FUNNOW’s latest deal therefore reflects more than a US$10 million investment or a Japan expansion. It points to an emerging model in which travel discovery, AI planning and real-time local commerce increasingly operate as parts of the same technology stack.
