Twiliner: Redefining business class travel - for the streets.

We recently sat down with Luca Bortolani to discuss his exciting endeavor, Twiliner. Twiliner aims to create a network of comfortable night buses across Europe, offering a stress-free, eco-friendly, and enjoyable way to explore the continent's most captivating cities.
Inspired by a challenging overnight bus journey from Zurich to Antwerp, Luca envisioned a service that combines business class comfort with road travel convenience, all while reducing the environmental impact of transportation.
To learn more about this innovative concept, we asked Luca about the inspiration behind Twiliner and the challenges he faced in bringing his vision to life.

OOMNIUM: What inspired you to develop the concept of Twiliner?

Luca Bortolani: After one back-breaking overnight bus from Zurich to Antwerp, I swore: never again! Like many, I love to travel, but want to fly less. We have such fantastic cities in Europe, like Barcelona, Antwerp, or San Sebastian – but getting there is a pain. Europe really needs a comfy, stress-free, and green way to get around.

OOMNIUM: What was the biggest challenge in bringing your vision of "business class seats on the road" to reality?

L.B.: There are no passenger safety systems for lie-flat travel on the road. Regulations are a nightmare. Together with fantastic partners – the Berne University of Applied Sciences, seat expert company Lantal, and several vehicle safety experts – and supported by Migros Pioneer Fonds and Innosuisse, we managed to tackle this hurdle.

Secure your shares

OOMNIUM: Your buses run on Diesel. Is this sustainable?

L.B.: We wanted to know this in detail and asked the foundation Myclimate to calculate the environmental impact of a bus trip with Twiliner. After all, this is our raison d’être. If we run on HVO diesel – made from used cooking oil – Twiliner is as climate-friendly as a train. With traditional diesel, traveling with Twiliner is as sustainable as traveling with a night train. In any case, it emits 80%-90% less CO2 equivalents than flying.

OOMNIUM: You launch your services this year. What is your goal, and how do you get there?

L.B.: By 2029, we’d love to have welcomed about a million passengers on board – that’s still only a tiny slice of the market. For this, we need to operate 160 buses and believe this is very doable. To get there, we use a platform approach. Two of Europe’s leading bus companies – Emile Weber from Luxembourg and Staf Cars from Belgium – signed up to invest in Twiliner buses and operate the routes. This allows us to focus on marketing, sales, and brand development. This upcoming year is all about learning. Which routes and customer segments work? Which services delight? How do we fine-tune the model? When we have this figured out, we want to scale rapidly in 2027.

OOMNIUM: How do you differentiate from other players in the market?

L.B.: For the time being, we are the only bus company that can legally provide lie-flat bus travel. Twiliner is more sustainable than flying and more flexible than trains. But this is only one side. Equally important is good customer service as a differentiator. A trip with Twiliner should feel easy and pleasant – book fast, sleep well, arrive relaxed. Let’s make travel stress-free and sustainable!

OOMNIUM: How will you use the capital raised in this OOMNIUM financing round?

L.B.: First, we want to fill our buses and create a buzz so that even more fantastic bus partners hop on board and railway companies join to sell tickets. Secondly, we want to reach break-even in early 2027 while at the same time improving our services, testing new business models, and continue investing in even better seats. This lays the basis of very rapid – almost unlimited – growth.

OOMNIUM: We're excited to see you take over the streets!