Travel portal Yatra.com has launched its operations in the US and the UK to combat the security hazards associated with using international credit cards on their domestic travel portal.
Targets revenues of $220 million by the end of the next fiscal
MUMBAI: Travel portal Yatra.com has launched its operations in the US and the UK to combat the security hazards associated with using international credit cards on their domestic travel portal.
It’s adopting a business-to-consumer (B2C) model in UK and business-to-business (B2B) model in the UK. B2C is a term used to describe electronic transactions between business and an individual consumer and B2B is electronic transactions between businesses.
Ashish Kishore, head of hotel and retail business for Yatra.com, said that the company has started a US-specific website that has all the security features to authenticate the transaction through international credit cards.
“We have recently opened office in the UK. However, unlike in India and the US where we started with the B2C model, it is the B2B (business-to-business) positioning that we are aggressively pursuing in the UK market. Our team is approaching agents there and asking them to make bookings for India through us,” Kishore said.
With the US and Europe constituting a fairly large chunk of international arrivals in India, the inbound business from these markets is considered important and highly profitable by the industry. In fact, experts are of the opinion that on a Rs 100 crore turnover, one can easily get a 15-20% share of the market. “It is quite a substantial sum for anyone to ignore,” said a travel industry expert.
Considering this, Yatra.com is positioning hotels and holidays as its primary products and low-cost ticketing its secondary offering. However, in India the positioning is just the opposite.
“In fact, B2B is what we will be pushing in the US market too as it is a very effective tool to gain market access besides instilling confidence in the brand. Thus, the approach is to start generating sustainable business through B2B and once it gains some traction, then launch B2C,” Kishore said. He said a lot of fraud was happening when a payment was made on their Indian URL with an international card as the company was unable to authenticate such transactions.
“What would happen is that when an international card was being used, a generic master card or a visa card check would happen but the specific bank check was not being done,” Kishore said.
This is because card companies in India are still not integrated with global card numbers and hence are not able to authorise transactions.
“The technology is still not available in India. Thus, we don’t entertain usage of international cards on the domestic site,” Kishore said.
On the contrary, when an Indian card is used for making payments, the transaction could easily be authenticated as these cards are mostly issued by Indian banks and online portals use a very high secured payment gateway.
The company has also launched its services on the mobile platform. According to Yatra.com, over 10,000 mobile users have downloaded the application on to their handsets. However, the management feels that the mobile business will take some time to catch up.
“I think that will happen once the 3G services are rolled out across the country. We are currently in talks with major mobile providers for embedding the Yatra application into the system itself,” Kishore said.
The online travel company is also pushing its retail chain brand Yatra.com Holiday Lounges.
In the first year of its operations since the launch of its store in Mumbai in April 2008, the company has opened 14 such lounges across the country. The company is now all set to launch two more outlets in Pune and Mumbai by 2009-end. “We envisage Maharashtra to contribute 30% to our total revenue through retail outlets and online bookings,” he said.
Averaging revenues of Rs 100 crore a month and a volume of more than 6,500 air tickets and 300+ hotel room nights per day, its turnover currently stands at Rs 1,500 crore. The company is targeting total revenues of $220 million by the end of the fiscal 2009-10.
t_ashish@dnaindia.net
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