The Airbnb rival offering childcare, personal trainers and chefs

Tired of the woes of frequent travelling, Karolina Saviova and Vivi Cahyadi set up their own full-service travel rental company, AltoVita, writes Andy Martin

AltoVita has expanded its operation to over 30 cities (Altovita)

The phrase “frequent traveller” suggests a life of ease and luxury. Doormen salute. Those business class seats are so comfy. Another glass of champagne, sir? Oh, all right then. But the reality is not quite so rosy. You’re not always living the dream. As Karolina Saviova discovered through bitter experience when she had to go to Mumbai on business a few years ago and booked an Airbnb place – only to end up left standing as darkness fell, “just me, my suitcase, and a lot of cows”. When you’re on the road you don’t want to end up on the street.

Thus was planted the seed that would become AltoVita, the a la carte travel platform for high fliers. Saviova, disenchanted with the life of a nomadic business journalist studying energy policy in Istanbul, India and Gabon, went to a party at the Four Seasons hotel in Mumbai. She knew nobody. But a guy asked her for a light. He turned out to be a good friend of Vivi Cahyadi and had a notion that the two women ought to meet. Thousands of miles apart, they were introduced via Skype, and hit it off.

They put paid to the absurd idea that east is east and west is west. Karolina, 28, was born in Prague, went to a French-speaking school, and studied international affairs in Paris at Sciences Po (the School of Political Science). Vivi, 36, was born in Java to Indonesian-Chinese parents, and went to school in Australia and college in the US. Between them they speak about a dozen languages, from Czech to Chinese. Fortunately for me that includes perfectly fluent English, as I found out when I went to meet them at the Landmark hotel opposite Marylebone Station.

Laid-back and informal, they prefer to use first names. “I was nerdy at school,” says Vivi, recalling her days at the Methodist Ladies College in Perth. “I was fond of physics, chemistry and maths. I’m still fairly nerdy. I love structure and logic.” Her Chinese family background gave her a strong entrepreneurial instinct. “It’s surprising how similar we are,” says Karolina. Her family was in real estate and Vivi had been managing a global property portfolio, shuttling between Tokyo, London and Jakarta.

Vivi had a work ethic, but you wouldn’t call it Protestant, maybe more Buddhist-Hindu-Islamic-Chinese. She occasionally took time out to go surfing too and once had a near-death experience at Ulu Watu in Bali, probably one of the most challenging waves in the world, with killer cliffs topped off by a temple presided over by a troop of monkeys. She was caught in the impact zone, took a series of waves on the head, and had to be rescued by her boyfriend. It’s an allegory of the traveller experience: you’re riding the crest of the wave, you’re having the time of your life, and then you wipe out and go under. In this metaphor, AltoVita is like a lifeguard, keeping your head above water.

The pair want to give frequent travellers more control over their lives (Altovita)

“When you’re a frequent traveller, it’s like you don’t have any control over your life,” says Vivi. “It’s commuting, but across continents. I wanted to create something especially for frequent travellers.”

The twain finally met face to face in 2016, in Prague, which is where they put together the plans for AltoVita. The solution, they realised, for the frequent traveller, is to give them more control. There is no package, but there is a menu. Do you want a gym or childcare when you get to where you are going? Or a night of entertainment? You choose. “You can see what you’re getting,” says Karolina. “Everyone is so savvy these days. Let them decide, not us.”

One of the things that Karolina was fed up with on her travels was the relatively unhealthy lifestyle: too much stress, too much junk food, no exercise. Over 80 per cent of travellers (in one of their surveys) confirm they want to stay healthy when they’re away, so AltoVita includes fitness, yoga and wellness classes on its menu. Personal trainers are on tap. Carbon offsetting probably makes you feel better too.

Karolina and Vivi put a lot of effort into “curation”, negotiating special deals in different cities in Europe, going around and meeting with all the local providers. After a year of research and product testing they launched in January 2018. They are currently raising further investment through Seedrs.com and have to date raised £228,000, well over their target figure.

The objective of AltoVita is to make you feel you are just living your life the way you want when you’re on the road, rather than the way the travel company/hotel tells you to. The typical corporate model is to use hotels. But AltoVita have over 4,000 privately owned properties to call on – real houses and apartments, a home from home, where you can stay for up to 28 days, and take your family with you. “It’s not luxury, but it’s professional,” says Karolina. “We’ve taken the guesswork out of it.” Vivi adds, “You can’t afford hit and miss. All our houses are verified and product-tested.”

Say you want to go to Budapest, for example. Check out altovita.com. All the travel and accommodation is done for you, with personal concierge service. But you can also click on “personal chef” if you so choose. Or reserve your fitness classes in English.

AltoVita has been concentrating on Europe hitherto, expanding to over 30 cities. The ambition now is to incorporate Asia and the US. The irony is that Karolina Saviova and Vivi Cahyadi quit their jobs because they were doing too much travelling – and now they’re doing more travelling than ever. But the standards have gone up. No one ends up on the street with the cows any more.