Heard of Goibibo, PayU money, Red bus, etc.? Well, indeed people who love to travel are well informed about these online travel organizations. But do you guys know how these undertakings came to existence and survived the cut–neck competition in the Indian market and who made it all possible and most importantly how?
This time around, we will be looking into the establishment of something as massive as the Ibibo business empire.
About Ibibo :
Ibibo Group is one of India’s premier online travel organizations and e-commerce service providers, which was founded back in the year 2007. Headquartered in Gurgaon, Haryana, the company is a subsidiary of MakeMy Trip (MMT) Limited, which owns a complete 100% stake in the Ibibio group.
This started its journey as a social networking service in 2007 but later turned out to be one of the most successful e-commerce and travel organization. The company launched Goibibo, the B2C online travel aggregator in the year 2009 and has never looked back since then.
Acquisition
Recently, in 2017 MakeMy Trip (MMT) made a very strategic business team or combination with the ibibo group by the means of 100% acquisition of equity interest in the Ibibo group from the MIH internet, which is an indirect subsidiary of Naspers.
About Founder
The founder of the Ibibo empire is Ashish Kashyap, who completed his Honors in Economics from the prestigious University of Delhi and went ahead to acquire a degree in Practicing Management from France. After, summing up with his studies, Kashyap stepped into the corporate world initially working for the renowned Times Group.
With his talent and extreme hardworking spirit, he worked his way up the corporate ladder, eventually becoming the General Manager of the very popular e-commerce platform India times.
Working for some of the World’s largest companies like Google, gave Ashish all the kinds of experiences he needed for building up his own entrepreneurial environment by launching the best of products and services. Not only this group, but Ashish is also the co-creator of PayU India, which in the year 2016 acquired CitrusPay.
With the internet’s growing popularity and usage, more and more websites and applications flooded the market, with each and every entrepreneur aiming to convert the opportunity in his favor. This also opened up avenues for several B2B and B2C companies to grab the opportunity with open arms and change the market forever.
Ashish decided to try his arms in the travel and tourism sector and revamped it forever by providing the customers with applications like Goibibo, Redbus, etc.
The company was backed by Napster, it was actually more of a social media experiment over being a firm company. The company started with just 8 employees in 2007, with just $50k as the seed or beginning capital, but by the end of the stint, it became a 15 member team.
The endeavor Ibibo transformed from being a hit and trial social media experiment to one of the largest names in the field of travel and tourism in a mere span of just half a decade.
Ashish Kashyap was one of the first Indians to sell a flight ticket online in 2002, and hence had all the expertise and knowledge to make his company turn into a million-dollar company and enter the unicorn club, and that is what he exactly did.
In a mere span of just a couple of years, the travel agency came up with its own payment portal, which was a blockbuster in the market. Ibibo setting the records straight is also the first online travel organization to offer a full refund on the cancellation of the bookings as per their terms and conditions.
With all its great policies with the great consumer services, by 2011 it had grown by 180% and had penetrated well in the Indian market. In order to enhance the payment portal of the company, Ibibo also partnered with giants like MasterCard, HDFC, and Citibank, etc.
Also, the company had flourished its business and added another color to its spark by launching a bus booking option and had acquired redBus for around 600 crores. Goibibo was launched in 2009, which offered the customers the best airline services.
By 2013, the company had expanded its business by 130% in the Indian market and was at its peak after having launched its own app for both Android and iOS. With continuous hard work and growing popularity, the company’s growth enhanced by 140% in 2014 and it added another milestone to its success by acquiring YourBus in the same year.
Investments and acquisitions
Bixee launched in 2005, is a former job search engine in India, with both vertical search and metasearch. It acquired Bixee in the year 2006, the Indian arm of the South African media giant Naspers.
Goibibo was launched in the year 2009 and is a part of the ibibo group, which also is India’s largest hotel aggregation and a leading flight aggregator too.
PayU India was another innovation from Ibibo’s kitty that had taken the Indian market floors by 2011. PayU permits websites to integrate e-commerce transactions through online payments and provides an API for integration and transaction analytics to improve the speed and security of payment processing.
RedBus is another extension to Ibibo after Goibibo’s addition to the company. RedBus became a part of the company through 100% acquisition and is currently India’s most popular and trusted online bus ticketing platform both on mobile and desktop. RedBus has also recently started its carpool and bike pool services by the name pool in Delhi.
YourBus is yet another successful acquisition by Ibibo in 2014. YourBus is a Bengaluru-based startup that was acquired by Ibibo is a GPS-based tracking and analytical system. It is a great startup and is also very helpful for the users as the YourBus application on a smartphone shows users the location of a bus in real-time on a map along with the user details like the arrival time at their pick-up point, with SMS updates.
Djubo is a cloud-based hotel service provider. It has a minority stake in it.
Overall Journey
In its 13 years, the Ibibo team has covered a long way from just being a small team of employees to a conglomerate that had colossal-sized properties and vast undertakings such as Goibibo.com, RedBus.com, YourBus, and Travelboutique with a reach extended to countries outside India. Yes! The ibibo team has its reach to several countries and has active participation in the markets of several countries like Indonesia, Singapore, and even Columbia.
The company has even more than 25 million app downloads and the transactions went over 24 million dollars USD. In a very short span of time, the Ibibo group has just established itself as a stalwart in the travel and tourism industry and there are still miles to go.
Goibibo is the greatest success story storming out from the minds of the creators at Ibibo. It is India’s largest hotel aggregation and a leading flight aggregator too. It has indeed become a pillar for the travel and tourism sector in India ever since it was launched. All the customer responses the company has got are tremendous. After merging with MMT via a deal worth some billions, all the business has eventually fallen under the Goibibo bracket, under the shades of MMT whose most of the shares are held by Naspers and Tencent.
Irrespective of the market competitions and various active factors affecting the businesses on the ground Goibibo that just started as a trivial social media campaign has turned out to one of India’s largest e-commerce and online travel organizations in just 5 years. The rate at which Goibibo has flourished is commendable. It has achieved a 200% growth in its business after it’s launched and is incessantly ruling the market.
Goibibo and other startups like these provide the kind of success stories that indeed fills our heart with renewed enthusiasm and courage to take chances and go after our dreams. It also inspires us to continuously keep on working hard and NEVER GIVE UP!
Kaushiki Rajhan is an expert content writer specializing in listicles, biographies, and case studies of startups and brands. With a passion for storytelling and a keen eye for detail, she crafts engaging and informative content that highlights the journeys and successes of businesses. Kaushiki’s work combines in-depth research with a clear, accessible writing style, making complex topics easy to understand and captivating for readers.
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