OpenAI Acquires AI Travel Startup Odessia in Apparent Acqui-Hire of Sonder Founder Francis Davidson

OpenAI has acquired Odessia, a year-old AI travel agent startup, in a deal that brings Sonder founder Francis Davidson into the company. Davidson announced the acquisition in November 2026, saying he is now working at OpenAI to help the AI lab with “the future of travel.” OpenAI did not announce the deal or confirm it to TechCrunch when asked.

Terms were not disclosed, but the deal appears to be an acqui-hire. Odessia, which raised a $6 million pre-seed round led by Sequoia, launched its AI travel agent roughly five months before the acquisition. Davidson said the tool had helped early adopters plan millions of dollars’ worth of travel, but the service has already been shut down.

Davidson is a familiar name in the travel industry. He founded Sonder in 2014 while still in college — a hospitality company focused on leasing upscale apartments in major cities, operating in a space similar to Airbnb. Sonder grew into a unicorn with $143 million in revenues before a series of setbacks, including pandemic-related damage, a SPAC listing that fell short of its capital needs, and the collapse of a key partnership with Marriott. Davidson resigned as CEO in June 2025, and the company subsequently went into bankruptcy. A bankruptcy trustee later sold Sonder’s name, trademarks, and website domain to TravelAI in 2026.

At Odessia, Davidson said he built the AI travel agent by directing teams of AI agents — an approach that appears to align with OpenAI’s existing interest in the travel sector. OpenAI counts Booking.com, Expedia, and KAYAK among its customers or partners, and when it launched its ChatGPT agent in July 2025, it cited travel as one of the tool’s potential uses.

What OpenAI plans to do with Davidson or any travel-specific products has not been announced. OpenAI had not responded to a request for comment at the time of publication.