Concur Increases Stake In India’s Cleartrip, Buys Out Sherpalo and Kleiner

Travel and expense management company Concur wants a bigger pie of the $3 billion Indian online travel market. The company has just concluded negotiations with Sherpalo Ventures and Kleiner Perkins to acquire additional stake in the Indian online travel startup Cleartrip.

In April 2011, Concur had invested $40 million in Cleartrip, to tap into India’s booming online travel booking market, which is now worth around $3 billion annually according to PhoCusWright, a global travel research company.

Together, Sherpalo and Kleiner had around 25% stake in Cleartrip, according to a source directly familiar with the developments.

Cleartrip founder and CEO, Stuart Crighton, had not responded to an email query at the time of writing this story. In January this year, a Cleartrip spokesperson had this to say in response to questions about Concur increasing its investment in the online travel startup:

Cleartrip continues to have a strong set of investors (which include Concur) that are aligned in building the best travel experience for all our customers. We continue to grow the business well despite a challenging market environment in both our core India and Middle East operations on the back of very strong performance, from both our Mobile and Hotel businesses.