Yatra.com registered top line revenues of $120 million in 2007 & is looking forward to become a $210 million entity by end 2008. Nikhil Rungta, Head of Marketing, Yatra.com opines, “Yatra.com being one of the largest players in online travel space is growing at a faster growth rate than the market (in 2008 we are looking at growing by more than 75% over 2007). Our constant endeavor is to provide better service to our customers.”
Well, the plans & dreams look
s picturesque. However there is a price to be paid for it as there are a lot of hardships which need to be addressed tactfully. Challenge one: More and more players are planning an entry into the world of online travel booking, with existing giants like Kuoni India & Thomas Cook rolling out travel portals soon. Challenge two: The dependence of industry on air-services needs to be reduced as budget airlines time & again threaten to reduce commissions which in-turn affect their bottom-lines.
To achieve these targets and remain competitive, the online players are following the hybridised model. They are aggressively entering non-air businesses like hotels and car rentals. More importantly, offering a complete platter of services via means of holiday packages is certainly a top priority for these companies as Deep explains, “We recognise that ‘hotels and holiday’ category will be the next big drivers of growth. Our relative success in the category is driven by a sharp focus on the quality of offerings (like building a portfolio of relevant partners, not just a huge number), and continued investment in product, technology and channel innovation.” In the last fiscal, MMT generated 10% of the total revenue from hotel bookings and in the current fiscal they believe that the domain will grow by a stupendous rate of 200%.
Moreover, as the traditional players enter into their territory, MMT and Yatra are strategically balancing their operations by setting up shops across the length and breath of the nation as Nikhil explains, “We recently opened Holiday Lounges in Delhi, NCR, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chennai & Mumbai. We plan to open 50 such outlets by 2008. These lounges focus on making customer buying process of a five star level.” Not far behind, MMT too is busy in broadbasing its delivery channels and is investing heavily in setting up offline touch-points – with regional offices in Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Kolkata, Pune, Chennai, Nasik et al. They currently have regional offices in 20 locations and plan to increase their presence rapidly. A focus area for MMT is also to aggressively promote its B2B solutions to agents and other intermediaries.
Well, the plans & dreams look
s picturesque. However there is a price to be paid for it as there are a lot of hardships which need to be addressed tactfully. Challenge one: More and more players are planning an entry into the world of online travel booking, with existing giants like Kuoni India & Thomas Cook rolling out travel portals soon. Challenge two: The dependence of industry on air-services needs to be reduced as budget airlines time & again threaten to reduce commissions which in-turn affect their bottom-lines.To achieve these targets and remain competitive, the online players are following the hybridised model. They are aggressively entering non-air businesses like hotels and car rentals. More importantly, offering a complete platter of services via means of holiday packages is certainly a top priority for these companies as Deep explains, “We recognise that ‘hotels and holiday’ category will be the next big drivers of growth. Our relative success in the category is driven by a sharp focus on the quality of offerings (like building a portfolio of relevant partners, not just a huge number), and continued investment in product, technology and channel innovation.” In the last fiscal, MMT generated 10% of the total revenue from hotel bookings and in the current fiscal they believe that the domain will grow by a stupendous rate of 200%.
Moreover, as the traditional players enter into their territory, MMT and Yatra are strategically balancing their operations by setting up shops across the length and breath of the nation as Nikhil explains, “We recently opened Holiday Lounges in Delhi, NCR, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chennai & Mumbai. We plan to open 50 such outlets by 2008. These lounges focus on making customer buying process of a five star level.” Not far behind, MMT too is busy in broadbasing its delivery channels and is investing heavily in setting up offline touch-points – with regional offices in Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Kolkata, Pune, Chennai, Nasik et al. They currently have regional offices in 20 locations and plan to increase their presence rapidly. A focus area for MMT is also to aggressively promote its B2B solutions to agents and other intermediaries.
3 comments:
iipm rockz, specially delhi campus
iipm great initiative by prof arindam chaudhuri
this article is great work
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