Despite feeling miserable, he was able to stick it out and take advantage of what he learned to develop a very useful app.
Lee Su-Jin is the founder of the Yanolja appwhich revolutionized the South Korean hotel industry. In his work as a hotel concierge, he learned to recognize the needs and improvements that these properties needed for guests and leveraged that knowledge to develop his own digital solution.
Yanolja is a platform for room reservation which is currently valued in billions of dollars. The establishments that inspired him were the well-known “love hotels” in Korea, which are designed to rent rooms for couples for just a few hours. Thus he was inspired to modify these places with the aim of making them more pleasant for customers.
Lee Sun-jin
How Yanolja emerged, an app that revolutionized hotels in South Korea
The project started as a simple review app and morphed into Yanolja, which means “let’s play” in Korean. In 2007 evolved into an online booking site which allowed users to see images of the rooms and even make reservations from their cell phones. In this way, the application made these hotels an attractive option for young couples, tourists and even families looking for accessible places.
Furthermore, in parallel, Lee convinced hotel owners to dedicate themselves to improving the facilities, structures and services of their buildings. Due to the experience obtained as a janitor, he knew the weaknesses and possibilities that this business had. With the success achieved in South Korea, Lee did not stop and think about expanding.
Yanolja’s expansion internationally
In 2021, he launched Yanolja Cloud, a software that helps hotels and travel companies manage their operationsfrom booking management to customer data analysis. In 2021, Japanese giant SoftBank, through its Vision Fund 2, acquired a 25% stake in Yanolja for $1.7 billion. Then came more big investors, investors like Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund and travel portal Booking. By then, the app already had a reach of more than 206 countries and more than 57 million downloads.
Before the appearance of Yanolja, motels and short-stay hotels were viewed with suspicion and associated exclusively with clandestine meetings. Now, thanks to the boost of the platform created by Lee, who has a fortune estimated at $2 billion, these establishments serve as popular options for travelers and tourists looking for affordable prices.
Source: Ambito
I am an author and journalist who has worked in the entertainment industry for over a decade. I currently work as a news editor at a major news website, and my focus is on covering the latest trends in entertainment. I also write occasional pieces for other outlets, and have authored two books about the entertainment industry.
