Why AI Can't "Vibe Code" Business Travel

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
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**Ann Berry** (0:27)
For Friday, July 24th, it's Brew Markets Daily and I'm Ann Berry.
One of my passions is travel, which I do for fun at every possible opportunity. But I do a lot for work too. I'm constantly hopping on to planes, trains and automobiles for board meetings, to look at deals, to go to conferences, and of course to Rome for interesting market ideas to talk about here on Brew Markets. When we talk a lot about travel stocks here, but I was particularly delighted to have the chance to sit down with Ariel Cohen, the co-founder and CEO of one travel industry company I frankly hadn't paid much attention to before. That's Navan, the AI-powered business travel and expense platform that's looking to transform that painful process of booking corporate travel and submitting receipts into a seamless experience. Well, Navan went public on the NASDAQ in October last year, and the stock is up since then. What really caught my eye is that the share price is up. Now, that is despite the SaaS apocalypse that's impacted other software names. Meaning, Navan's reached a market cap today of around $7 billion. And while the biggest AI players who are seen to threaten many software names are looming out there, they have become Navan's clients flipping the traditional narrative on its head. Well, it was a fun conversation, and I was pleased to have Ariel Cohen join me here in the studio.
Ariel Cohen, I got to tell you, I am a rabidly enthusiastic traveler.

**Ariel Cohen** (1:51)
Yes.

**Ann Berry** (1:52)
And Navan is possibly the one travel company I've heard about the least. And I cover this all day. So I'm really excited to dig in here. I think I may remember you more as trip action. We'll talk about your rebranding. But CEO, co-founder, in your own words, for people who, like me, did not know enough about your company, describe what you do.

**Ariel Cohen** (2:10)
Yes, we actually view ourselves as really making sure that this is happening, that the in-person connections, that people are meeting for business, for any other thing. So it's all about that. We are really, from the day we started the company, we believe in this thing, the in-person connections, making sure that people can focus on that and not all of the things that are happening to you while you're traveling. So in a very, very simple way, you can book your trips through us. We are managing it for your employer. You can expense, you can pay for your trips. But the entire idea is not to focus on this and really bringing you here.

**Ann Berry** (2:49)
So let's talk about what that means in terms of products. You founded in 2015

**SPEAKER_1** (2:52)
Yes.

**Ann Berry** (2:53)
Name them as TripAction.

**SPEAKER_1** (2:54)
Yes.

**Ann Berry** (2:55)
And walk through, paint the picture. I've got my cell phone in studio, which is a bit cheeky. But if I had your app on my phone right now, describe what it would look like for folks.

**Ariel Cohen** (3:03)
Super, super easy to use. It is probably, you mentioned that you cover travel as well. It's probably the best product out there to plan, to book your trip, to support yourself while you're on the go. And then when you're coming back to just everything is easy. I'm talking about expense management. So you come to the product, the product knows you, kind of knows in advance what you are likely to book.

**Ann Berry** (3:27)
And what your employer's budget is for your travel. Because this is, so folks understand, this is an employer-led product and employees are using it.

**Ariel Cohen** (3:36)
It's true. And something very unique about Navan is that we looked at this, we know that we need to sell it to a company.
But the person that we really care about is the employee that is traveling, the EA, the executive assistant that somebody sometimes supports, the execs, and then everybody that are involved in these things. So we really, really believe that all of these people need to have really good product. We measure ourselves like a consumer brand. We care about NPS, CSAT. We assume that although the employee is being told to use that product, they have a choice. They can actually find an excuse to book outside, which is a very big part of this thing. So we want them to love the product. And one of the main reasons that they love the product, it takes almost no time to book. In average, it's seven minutes to book an entire business trip, which tends to be complex. When you want to change it, you're actually chatting with Eva, which is actually our AI bot, that will support you in seconds. It will change your entire trip. You're stuck in the airport. It will find a solution immediately. So really, really making sure that you'll be okay.