San Francsico-based business software platform Rippling has added a corporate travel booking tool via a partnership with travel distribution platform Duffel, the companies announced.
The Rippling Travel tool resides in Rippling's Spend Management suite, which includes corporate card, expense management and bill-pay capabilities. Users now can book flights and hotels within the Rippling platform, with content provided by an integration with Duffel Flights and Duffel Stays, which Rippling Travel product lead Timo Sheridan said "gives companies full visibility and real-time control for the first time." Finance teams can monitor travel activity, and receipts, VAT codes, exchange rates and budgets are synced automatically, according to the companies.
Corporate booking tools have been a growing offering among business software providers. Last year, Zoho Corp.—which provided a range of business management tools including accounting, email and customer relationship management—launched a spend management solution that included travel booking. Corporate spend management platform Ramp also launched Ramp Travel last year, built upon an integration with Priceline.
Rippling's products span HR, IT and spending, and in May the company announced $450 million in new financing that brought its valuation to $16.8 billion. At the time of that announcement, Rippling CEO Parker Conrad in a blog post said the company's aim is "helping companies manage and automate every part of the employee lifecycle in a single platform, giving employees a centralized place to manage and make changes across their business systems."