TravelAI, the operating name of UpNext Ventures and its subsidiaries, has purchased the Sonder brand assets.
The acquired assets include the Sonder word mark, related global trademark registrations and a portfolio of domains, notably Sonder.com.
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The transaction is limited to Sonder’s brand and intellectual property. Sonder’s operating business, such as properties, leases, inventory or staff, were not part of the deal.
Following the acquisition, Sonder.com has been relaunched as a curated guide to urban accommodation including apartment-style homes and boutique hotels.
It will serve as a consumer brand built on the “memory infrastructure” TravelAI is developing for the travel industry.
TravelAI co-founder and CEO John Lyotier said: “Sonder earned something rare: a name people remember and a standard of taste they trusted.
“We did not acquire a portfolio of buildings. We acquired the one travel brand whose name already means what we are building with our memory infrastructure.
“Where the old Sonder’s technology once lived in the lock on the door, it now lives in discovery, memory, and AI-enabled personalisation.”
Sonder was founded in Montreal in 2014 and later listed on Nasdaq, becoming one of the most recognised names in its segment.
The brand now becomes part of a growing portfolio of travel brands that TravelAI has acquired and revived in recent years, including Casai, Smartours and OwnerDirect.
In its new iteration, Sonder is curating places to stay in Amsterdam, Barcelona, Boston, Chicago, Dubai, London, Miami, New York, and most major urban centres worldwide.
Lyotier added: “We intend to treat the brand with the respect it deserves: keeping what made it Sonder, and giving it a future. This is a new chapter, written with care, for the one that came before.”
