Online travel bookings are set to boom in India

Online travel bookings are set to boom with the industry doubling its revenues in less than 12 months. Industry sources say that the $460 million Indian online-travel industry is slated to become $1-billion industry by the end of this year and $2 billion by end of 2008.

On one hand, global players like Washington-based Expedia and Texas- based travel portal Travelocity are entering the Indian market, on the other hand, Indian players are looking at tie-ups. For instance, Indiatimes.com travel will soon enter into a revenue-sharing arrangement with a global player to increase its inventory of holiday packages and hotels. To spice up the scene, Tripmela, which publishes top 10 deals available across Indian travel portals every week, is also active in the area. It is in talks with various Indian travel portals for an investment of around $1 million.

To capture the growing potential of online travel market, Travelocity will start its India-focussed website in February. Tripmela, US-based website, targeting Indian market, is also eyeing Indian travel. “Indian online travel market has great potential which we want to capture ,”says Jared Blank, CEO, Tripmela.com.

The online travel market is at present dominated by players such as indiatimes.com, makemytrip.com, yatra.com and travelguru.com. Indiatimes travel will be tying up with a global online travel portal soon. “The tie-up will help us in accessing their inventory of hotels and packages and will help them in getting more customers,” Sharat Dhall, e-commerce head, Indiatimes.com told ET.

Yatra.com, which has Reliance Capital, Television Eighteen and Norwest Venture Partners as its investors, is also open to the idea of tying up with a domestic travel portal. “A tie-up can get us new customer segment, though currently we are looking at domestic players only. Next six months will see the online travel space getting very aggressive and competitive,” says Dhruv Shringi, co-founder, Yatra.com. The company’s revenue projection for the year ending December 2007, is $100 million.

Many small players till 2006 like IndiaHotelReview.com are gaining great business and creating niche platforms. "Travel in India has a great potential, Big global travel gaints are now realising the scope in india. We in IndiaHotelReview.com are in the business for our specialization in budget travel. The huge chunk of our society are middle class and they dont 5 star luxury suites to spent their holiday. They just need value for money holidays. We are offering vacation packages starting from as low as Rs.2199 in a hotspot like kerala. The market potential is great as long as you provide value for money travel solutions," says Ankit Rastogi, Vice President, IndiaHotelReview.com.

According to industry heads, the online travel space in India is registering almost a 100% growth year-on-year. “The rapidly growing online travel space will see lot of consolidations along with expansions and new entrants,” says Sachin Bhatia, co-founder, makemytrip.com. The portal’s expects a revenue of $121 million this fiscal.

Tie-ups, expansion, consolidations and a lot more - all to woo the Indian travellers seem to the new motto for the travel portals. “Travellers will surely get great deals online this year with increased competition among players,” says Ashwin Damera, CEO, Travelguru.com. The website’s is expecting a turnover of $25 million this fiscal.

The Indian travel & tourism (T&T) industry has been ranked as the second fastest growing T&T economy, Internet has crossed 25 million mark and e-commerce sales are likely to touch Rs 1080 crores by end of 2006.

source: economic times