The online travel search engine cFares has raised $4.5 million in a round A venture capital led by Claremont Creek Ventures, and including existing backer Garage Technology Ventures. cFares was indeed doing quite well since its inception and previously caught the eyes of the venture capitalist with the received of a $1.5 million early seed funding last year. The direction of this cFares is relatively straight forward, a vertical search engine, by charging a $50 subscription fee, members (Platinum and Gold) can access to the wholesaler discounts, normally in the range of $30 to $50 below price of the publicly available fares. However, the online travel industry is too hot in the U.S. now, so they have developed a patent-pending search technology that allowed users a 360 degree view of all the fares in the market. Meanwhile, live chat support will also be available for the cFares “Small Business Travel Program.” As I visited their search page, the search results seem to be an aggregate airlines and discount sites’ listings, to be served as a major purpose to show users that they can compare the fares in a cFares “one-stop” travel fare site. Though they have income revenue by charging the subscription fees, their major business model apparently is based on Google AdSense.

cFares is based in Redwood Shores, California and founded in year 2005. There is more information regarding to this venture capital on this site.