A new payment-processing system tops Sion's plans following seed money infusion

Commission payment management platform Sion has secured $3.2 million in seed funding that it will use to scale its operation and reach new goals for the platform, including a payment-processsing system.

The funding was led by venture capital fund TIA Ventures, which focuses on B2B software, and includes participation from SmartFlyer and Virtuoso, as well. In 2020, Sion had secured $1.3 million in a preseed round.

Sion, a graduate of Virtuoso’s Travel Incubator program, enables agent users to track and manage the commisisons they are owed. It offers real-time reporting, supplier invoicing and more. It was developed by longtime travel advisor Irving Betesh and his best friend, Alfons Musry, who founded Sion together in 2019.

“Before Sion, we spent most of our time invoicing and chasing down commissions, which was an all-consuming and tedious process,” Betesh said in a statement. “We’ve created something that makes a significant impact within the industry and improves all aspects of how travel agents run their business, focusing on the back office so they can spend more time closing new business.”

Currently, around 2,000 agents are subscribed to Sion.

The latest round of funding, Betesh said in an interview, will ultimately help his company onboard more travel advisors. There is a “huge pipeline” of agencies waiting to be onboarded onto the platform.

“The funding allows us to do things that we haven’t had the luxury to do over the past few years,” Betesh said. “It allows us primarily to scale because we are at a point now where the interest in Sion is sort of outgrowing our very small team that we’ve had up until this point.”

Next year, integration will be a “huge focus” for the company, Betesh said. Sion plans to offer integration with other systems, from general ledgers like QuickBooks, customer relationship management platforms and itinerary-development applications.

Betesh said Sion is also developing the ability for suppliers to proactively process commission payments directly on the platform.

“Our main focus is on what’s most important to our users, which is their time and their money,” Betesh said.

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