The stated aim is to work on ‘the future of travel’.
The developer of the AI travel agent Odessia says it has been acquired by OpenAI.
© Rokas
Details of the deal were outlined in a statement shared by Francis Davidson, Odessia’s founder and now in charge of travel at OpenAI.
Francis Davidson, also known as co-founder of Sonder, a sector unicorn, describes Odessia’s operation as an aggregation of AI agents called upon across most of the company’s functions, with the website now unavailable ‘as part of this transition’.
Founded very recently, the company presents itself as an AI-powered travel agent capable of building a complete itinerary, with flights, hotels and activities, from a simple conversation.
The company holds IATA travel agent accreditation, allowing it to access certain private hotel rates and offer perks such as breakfast or room upgrades.
Since 14 October, Odessia had also presented itself as a free concierge service accessible via SMS or messaging.
“We are delighted to welcome Francis to OpenAI,” said an OpenAI spokesperson in TechCrunch. “Francis is a seasoned founder who has created multiple businesses designed to make travel easier, and we are thrilled that he has chosen to join us to build the future.”
OpenAI is pursuing its ambition to make travel an essential use case for what AI can offer.
As early as 2023, Kayak and Expedia integrated ChatGPT to enable natural-language travel searches.
The growth of connectors saw the main players join the LLM’s conversations in October 2025.
Odessia is understood to be OpenAI’s first acquisition in the travel sector.