Rail booking startup Capitaine Train has pulled into the station with Euro 5.5 million in additional financing.
The rail booking startup previously raised Euro 2.5 million back in June 2013, following on from a Euro 1.4 million round in February 2012.
This round was led French firm Alven Capital, joining previous investors Index Ventures and CM-CIC Capital Privé.
Other investors particpating in this round included Xavier Niel (founder of Free and the Iliad group) and Pierre Bonelli (founder of liligo.com).
The cash will be used to expand the team, which has doubled over the past year. Additional funds will be directed to business development efforts in France and Europe at large.
In a significant move, the financing news was announced alongside the hire of Daniel Beutler from Deutsche Bahn France, where he was CEO. Beutler will join the team as COO, and focus on furthering operational growth.
The company claims it is the number one independent distributor of train tickets in Europe, as it has taken on the difficult task of aggregating inventory from state-run entities to make it bookable online.
This feat has yet to be accomplished in a thorough fashion, as it takes a brute force approach to secure access to this data and integrate with various technologies - similar to the way airline fares were ported online over time across systems. Except in this case, the majority of systems are state-owned enterprises, adding a political layer to the effort.
Capitaine Train has just under 500,000 users who are booking 5,000 tickets daily.