How it came that you could book your bus tickets online

The name redBus has a funny history. Its founders were certain of one thing when they wanted to name their venture: it had to do something with a colour. “Then marketing becomes easier,” says Phanindra Sama, chief executive officer, redBus.in, and one of the three founders. They finally decided on red, because the word has just three letters.

redBus, India’s first organised and online bus ticket booking service, was the only player of its kind in the world when it launched in August 2006, claims Sama. “I got the idea in 2005, when I wanted to go home, in Hyderabad, for Diwali, but couldn’t because I didn’t get a bus ticket. This is when I found that there was no database of buses.”

Soon after, Sama, then 25, with Texas Instruments, got in touch with his friends from BITS Pilani, Charan Padmaraju, 25, and Sudhakar Pasupunuri, 24, to bring his idea to fruition.

They entered a business plan competition conducted by the Bangalore chapter of the The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE), which later came on board as a mentor.

redBus has since scaled new highs. With two rounds of funding from three venture capital firms, redBus broke even in January and is now looking at ending this year with revenues of Rs150 crore.

“When we started it, we just wanted to make it a Rs1 crore company,” quips Sama. redBus, whose commission-based revenue model is looking at turning over Rs500 crore by 2012.
redBus now links 700 bus operators in 15 states, covering about 10,000 routes. Other than the online booking service, the company has two offerings, Bus Operators Software service (BOSS) and Seat Seller. While operators can maintain their own inventory using BOSS, redBus distributes bus inventories to makemytrip.com, yatra.com and other such websites using Seat Seller. What this means is, when you book a bus ticket on any of these sites it is through Seat Seller.

Bringing hundreds of bus operators under one roof, or rather, one website, has been far from easy. But having found its footing, redBus is now looking to spread its wings. “We are looking to expand our business to Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina and Spain,” Phani says.

redBus is also planning to venture beyond its core area of bus ticket booking and has started charter services. “Recently, someone approached us looking for a caravan. We searched a lot and finally managed to find one and he was very happy,” Phani narrates.

With millions travelling between cities by bus everyday and no real competition yet, redBus is hoping for anything but a bumpy journey.