Hire Space VS Naboo
Whole-market research with grounded estimates vs procurement-led booking over a curated inventory
Naboo is a well-funded procurement platform for corporate events, strong on spend control. Hire Space brings the same procurement control, built on more than a decade of hands-on events experience, with whole-market coverage and grounded estimates in seconds.
Procurement over a curated list, or the whole market grounded in real pricing
Naboo, founded in 2022, started with corporate away-days and has since raised heavily to build out an AI-powered events-procurement platform: venues, catering, transport, payments and reporting wrapped around its own curated marketplace. The procurement and spend-control engineering is genuinely strong, and for a finance or ops team that wants every booking in policy and every pound accounted for it does a serious job. But the centre of gravity is procurement and control, not the venue search itself. The venue layer is bounded by the curated inventory the platform has assembled, and the AI suggests from inside that inventory rather than the open market. That is a deliberate design choice that keeps spend tidy, and it is also the ceiling: you can only book, and the AI can only recommend, what is already on the list.
Hire Space starts from the venue and works outward. We match the procurement control a serious finance team needs, one contract, full spend visibility, in-policy bookings and reporting across 37 currencies, and we add what a whole-market platform with deep events experience can. Our research runs across the entire market, any venue, anywhere, including new openings and spaces nobody has listed yet, so the answer is not capped by an inventory. The AI is grounded in more than a decade of realised transaction data rather than generating from a fixed list, so a suggestion is a real venue with a realistic, data-backed estimate, in about ten seconds. The venue confirms the final figure. And behind the platform is a team that has actually delivered events for over a decade, with that hands-on experience built in.
From brief to booking
Two ways to keep spend in control, pick the one that fits how your team buys.
| Hire Space Guided Grounded, whole-market research with procurement control and a team behind it | Naboo Procurement Procurement-led booking over a curated marketplace | |
|---|---|---|
| Search | Describe your brief, researched across the whole market Any venue, anywhere, including new openings | AI suggests from the curated marketplace Bounded by the platform inventory |
| Price | Data-backed estimate in ~10 seconds Indicative, grounded in a decade of realised transaction data | Pricing from the curated inventory Generated over a fixed list rather than realised history |
| Shortlist | A priced shortlist, with alternatives and hotels Every option already carries an estimate, so you compare like for like straight away | Options from within the marketplace Capped by what the platform has curated |
| Decide | Choose your venue, in policy From a priced shortlist, straight away | Choose your venue, in policy From the curated marketplace |
| Contract | We contract, pay and invoice One contract, full spend visibility, 37 currencies | Centralised procurement, spend and reporting Strong spend governance over the curated inventory |
| Typically | < 20 mins brief to priced shortlist | Within the inventory fast on platform, capped to curated venues |
The Hire Space price is an indicative, data-backed estimate to plan around. The venue then follows with a full quote to confirm the final figure.
Built for business events
The first thing is depth of pricing. Naboo, founded in 2022, is a serious platform, but a price estimate is only as good as the history behind it, and that history takes years of real bookings to build. We have spent more than a decade recording what venues actually charged for real events, so when you describe a brief a realistic number comes back in about ten seconds. It is an estimate the venue still confirms, but it is grounded in transactions that happened, not generated from a list.
The second is reach. A curated marketplace can only book and recommend what it has signed up. Our research runs across the whole market, so the answer can be a venue nobody has listed yet, a new opening, a room in a city the platform has never indexed. The procurement control comes with that reach rather than instead of it: one contract, full spend visibility, in-policy bookings and reporting across 37 currencies, over the entire market rather than a closed inventory.
The third is the events experience behind the software. Naboo is procurement engineering first, and that engineering is strong. Hire Space is a team that has actually run events for over a decade, with that judgement built into the platform and a named expert on hand when an event is large or has moving parts, to negotiate, run the site visits and manage the detail. You get the spend governance and the people who know how events really come together.
Where the curated-platform model hits its ceiling
Naboo is a strong procurement platform, but two limits come with the curated model itself. Hire Space is built without them.
You only see the curated marketplace
- Venues are bounded by the inventory the platform has curated
- New openings and unlisted spaces stay off the list
- Great for spend control, narrow for a specific brief
Generative suggestion over a fixed list
- The AI can only recommend what is already in the marketplace
- Pushed past the list, generative suggestions can drift to venues that do not fit or do not exist
- Built on a younger dataset than a decade of realised pricing
Procurement control, the whole market, grounded AI
- The same spend control, one contract, in-policy, 37 currencies, plus whole-market reach
- Any venue worldwide, grounded in a decade of realised pricing
- A team that has delivered events for over a decade, with deep hands-on experience
Head to head
Hire Space figures from realised bookings and Hire Space 360. Naboo figures reflect its structural model as a curated procurement platform, founded 2022.
An honest decision framework
Naboo is a serious, well-resourced option, especially for European teams wanting an all-in-one procurement platform with strong spend governance over a curated inventory. Hire Space competes directly on procurement control while adding deep events experience, whole-market reach and grounded estimates.
- You want procurement control and the whole market, not a curated list.
- You want a data-backed estimate in seconds, grounded in a decade of real pricing.
- You value a team with more than a decade of hands-on events delivery.
- You want one contract, full spend visibility, in-policy bookings and multi-currency reporting.
- You are a European team wanting an all-in-one procurement platform.
- Strong spend governance over a curated inventory is your priority.
- Your venue needs sit comfortably inside the curated marketplace.
- You want venues, catering, transport and payments under one procurement roof.
Frequently asked
Naboo is a procurement-led events platform that books and recommends from its own curated marketplace, with strong spend control around it. Hire Space brings the same procurement control, one contract, in-policy bookings and multi-currency reporting, but researches the whole market rather than a curated list and grounds every estimate in a decade of realised transaction data.
Corporate events where you want spend governance and the whole market. You get a data-backed estimate in about ten seconds, any venue anywhere instead of a curated inventory, AI grounded in real pricing history and a team that has delivered events for over a decade.
All-in-one procurement, especially for European teams. If your venue needs sit comfortably inside its curated marketplace and strong spend governance over that inventory is the priority, Naboo does that job well.
Yes. You get one contract, full spend visibility, in-policy bookings and reporting across 37 currencies. The difference is that the procurement control comes with whole-market reach and grounded estimates rather than a curated inventory.
Naboo books and recommends from its own curated inventory, which is what keeps spend tidy and in policy. The trade-off is that you can only book, and the AI can only suggest, what is already on the list. Hire Space researches the whole market instead, including new openings and unlisted spaces.
An AI layer over a curated marketplace can only recommend what is in the marketplace, and generative suggestion beyond it can drift to venues that do not quite fit. Hire Space research is grounded: every result is a real venue anchored to realised pricing history, searched across the open market.
A strong procurement platform over a curated inventory.
The same procurement control, with deeper events experience, the whole market and grounded estimates.