After 5 Million Travel App Downloads, Chinese Startup Seeks $1 Million in Funding

Building a startup that’s focused on free apps is always a tricky business, and so the Chinese company 8684 is heralding its milestone of five million users of just one of its series of travel and transportation apps by stating that it’s now ready for a million dollar round of series A funding. It’s not the first time that the 8684 team has said this, having previously hinted that it’s in talks with CDH Ventures, IDG, and a few others about its first major financing that would value the startup at an effective 100 million RMB ($15.86 million). Brave talk or bluster? The VCs are the ones who’ll decide.

8684 makes free – and mostly ad-free – apps like 8684 Metro (pictured below), 8684 Trains, and 8684 Buses. That latter one has hit the impressive five million marker all by itself. All those stylish and very useful iOS and Android apps cover most of China’s major cities. Major web companies like Baidu and Tencent are not making apps like these (aside from their general maps services), so the travel apps are clearly proving popular. But monetization is a whole other matter.

The 8684 team, says Chinese-language tech blog 36kr, is now up to 80 individuals in size, and is based in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou.

At the moment, the startup is making money from partnerships with other travel firms, such as its flight ticket search engine which actually leads users to eLong (NASDAQ:LONG), the nation’s second-largest online travel operator. There’s also a recently-added hotel booking portal of its own, replete with phone support staff, putting the startup up against the likes of eLong and Ctrip (NASDAQ:CTRP). These are all run from its 8684.cn and 8684.com sites.

If you want more leisure-related China apps that are perfect for use in China, check out those 8684 apps or this other selection of travel apps that my colleague made last year.

[Sources: Tech2IPO and 36kr – articles in Chinese]