Access Group Agrees to Buy Talent Funnel to Expand A.I. Hiring Tools for Hospitality

The Access Group said Wednesday that it has agreed to acquire Talent Funnel, a British recruitment software company focused on hospitality, in a deal aimed at expanding its artificial intelligence tools for hiring and workforce management across restaurants, hotels and other service businesses.

The transaction, which is subject to completion, is expected to close in August. Financial terms were not disclosed.

The acquisition brings a specialist applicant tracking system into Access Hospitality, the company’s hospitality division, at a time when operators across the sector continue to face labor shortages, high turnover and pressure to fill jobs quickly during seasonal peaks. Talent Funnel’s software is designed for high-volume hiring in hospitality and includes tools for branded careers sites, candidate screening, onboarding and compliance.

Talent Funnel, founded in 2016, serves more than 100 customers in Britain, including The Ivy Collection, GAIL’s Bakery, Itsu, Compass Group and Nightcap, according to the companies. Its platform is used across more than 2,193 hospitality sites and handles about 3 million applications a year, supporting the hiring of roughly 75,000 employees annually.

Access said Talent Funnel has grown its customer base by 435% since 2022, reflecting what both companies described as rising demand for recruitment technology tailored to hospitality. The sector has long dealt with rapid staff turnover and uneven demand patterns tied to holidays, tourism flows and weekend trade. Those pressures have pushed many operators to adopt software that can speed up hiring while helping managers track training, scheduling and payroll in one system.

Talent Funnel will become part of Access Hospitality and be integrated into Access Evo, the company’s broader AI-enabled software platform. Access said the goal is to connect recruitment with other parts of the employee lifecycle, including onboarding, scheduling, learning and payroll, so that data and workflows move through one system rather than separate tools.

For hospitality businesses, that means an applicant could move from job posting to hiring and onboarding and then into rota management, training records and payroll within the same software environment. Access said that approach is intended to reduce the time managers spend switching between systems and improve decision-making through shared data and AI-driven insights.

Martin Verdon-Roe, chief commercial officer for Access Hospitality F&B, said in a statement that Talent Funnel was built specifically around the way hospitality businesses recruit and that its focus on multi-site hiring made it a strong fit for Access’s existing products.

Chris Eccles and Andre Boeke, the co-chief executives of Talent Funnel, said they would remain with the business after the acquisition. In a joint statement, they said joining Access would give Talent Funnel more resources to develop its product faster than it could as an independent company.

The deal adds another layer to Access Hospitality’s people management portfolio, which already includes Rotaready Evo for workforce management and human resources, CPL Learning Evo for training and development, and Paycircle Evo for payroll. By adding applicant tracking software built for hospitality employers, Access is positioning itself to offer a more complete employment platform to operators trying to manage staffing from recruitment through retention.

The Access Group is one of the largest business management software providers headquartered in Britain. The company says it serves more than 160,000 small and midsize organizations across Europe, the United States and Asia-Pacific and employs more than 9,500 people. Its hospitality division says it works with over 45,000 hospitality sites in Britain and more than 100,000 venues worldwide.

The acquisition reflects a broader shift in hospitality technology as software companies compete to offer integrated systems that can help employers manage labor costs and staffing challenges more precisely. For restaurants and hotel groups operating across multiple locations, recruitment has become closely tied to broader operational planning. Hiring delays can affect service levels, guest experience and revenue during busy periods, especially when businesses need workers who can start quickly and meet compliance requirements.

In recent years, AI tools have become more common in hospitality hiring systems, particularly for screening applicants, automating communications and managing large volumes of candidates. Companies selling those tools argue that automation can shorten time-to-hire and reduce administrative work for managers who are often balancing staffing needs with day-to-day operations on site.

Talent Funnel’s appeal appears to rest on that specialization. Unlike general-purpose recruiting platforms used across industries, its system was built around hospitality’s specific needs, including flexible shifts, frequent turnover and large-scale hourly hiring. That niche focus helped it win business from restaurant groups and contract catering operators looking for faster ways to recruit at scale.

AMP Strategists advised Talent Funnel on the transaction.