Get 100% Real-Time Digitalised Bus Ticket At Your Door Step
How do you generally plan your trip? In all likelihood, you usually go to a travel agent to book tickets and prepare an itinerary for you. Am I right? Aurvind Lama, founder of Travelyaari also did the same when he was on a trip. He needed to book a ticket for himself, so he reached out to a travel agent, where he came to know, that he was being overcharged by the agent in Koromangala for a bus journey.
Knowing that the agent was trying to take him for a ride, he decided to explore for more bus options and went to Majestic. This incident, which took place during his days at IIM-Ahmedabad, gave Lama the idea to build an online reservation service, which made booking a bus ticket, a far more transparent process while keeping the convenience of the travellers at the top of its charts.
Travelyaari is an online bus booking platform, which leverages technology-based solutions, to simplify and streamline bus ticketing processes.
Founded in 2008 by Lama and others, the company is looking to make life easier for Indian travellers, by bringing in service providers and travellers on to one end-to-end integrated platform.
On asking him whether entrepreneurship was something he always wanted to do, Lama, said, “From the very beginning I was keen on entrepreneurship and wanted to create a self-sustaining business environment. My confidence and self-belief helped me to become an entrepreneur. The minor ups and downs during the initial stages of Traveyaari’s inception and my ability to deal with all of them without losing my momentum and bigger vision made me realise that this was always meant to be.”
If we look at the figures, the total annualized worth of the segment, including the government and private inter- and intra-city bus travel, is estimated to be around $73.3 billion; in comparison, the rail travel industry in the country is worth around $7 billion and the Indian air travel industry is worth $6 billion.
Travelyaari is creating a deep-rooted supply chain model for the bus ticket industry, that penetrate, as many big and small cities as possible, and helping people all over India to book affordable bus tickets without any hassle.
What makes them stand apart?
With the vision is to increase the affinity of the Indian consumer towards road travel, given that most of India still travels by bus, TravelYaari’s USP lies in bringing all the key stakeholders – service providers, agents, OTAs and consumers – across online and offline channels, onto a single platform to provide end-to-end ticketing solutions.
Service/Offerings
It has heralded the creation and implementation of a 100% real-time digitalized bus ticket inventory system across India.
In addition to its B2C bus ticketing service, the platform offers ERP solutions to more than 2000 bus transporters through BusCRS and is also the provider of the largest inventory distribution service to OTAs and online and offline travel agents through its global distribution system.
Expansion plans
At present, over 4000 operator outlets and 5000 direct agents are on board its platform conducting an annual business worth $450 million.
A pan-India brand with a monopoly in North, Central and West India, where it holds a 90% share of the digitalized inventory, Startup is looking to expand its present geographical footprint of over 1 lakh routes in terms of both width and depth with forays into more number of tier-2 and tier-3 markets across India.
Further, it is looking to enhance its system intelligence and create a robust ecosystem around road travel, by including pickup and drop services, food, and stays, as it sets out to fulfil its vision of building a reliable brand around road travel in India.
Startups like these are turning Prime Minister’s vision of Digital India into reality. So next time whenever you plan for a trip, do consider this option.
