India is witnessing a sudden boom in travel startups for the past few years. A few contributory factors can be the wide availability of internet, smartphone penetration and, more importantly, the exponentially growing number of inbound and outbound travellers. We learn about new travel startups everyday and some of them really push the envelope of innovation.

To identify and support such innovations, we announced our Startup Knockdown series of events recently. The first event in the series will be hosted in Mumbai next month in association with OTM Mumbai and the second event will be hosted in New Delhi in association with FICCI and Amadeus. Not only will the startups get to showcase their product in front of leading industry professionals but will also have other opportunities to give their business a boost.

While we hunt for the next Uber or Airbnb, check out some travel startups that have been making news in India:

#1 Tripoto

Founded by Anirudh Gupta and Michael Lyngdog in 2013, Tripoto offers travel itineraries for travellers and holiday makers. It has a huge collection of photos, reviews and recommendations shared by travellers who have explored the different corners of the world and are ready to communicate their travel experiences with others. Also, users have the liberty to add attractive trips in their wishlist.

Language: English

#2 iTraveller

Launched by Shiju Radhakrishnan in 2012, iTraveller provides 3,50,000+ trips for 450+ destinations at highly competitive rates compared to other online travel booking sites. It offers packages at extremely cheap rates simply because of very few intermediates. It allows travellers to discover, plan and book tickets instantly by connecting them with the native destinations suppliers.

Language: English

#3 goMowgli

Founded by Sunil Abhilash, Anil Alur, and Karan Cariappa in 2013, goMowgli claims to be India’s first hop-on and hop-off bus for travellers. Through this service, travellers can engage in innumerable activities, stay wherever they want with absolute freedom. The interesting feature of goMowgli is that the bus passes it offers is valid till 60 days from the date of first travel. This allows travellers to make changes in their travel itineraries at the last minute with no complications.

Language: English, German, French, Spanish

#4 SeekSherpa

Launched by Dhruv Raj Gupta and Sukhmani Singh in 2014, SeekSherpa lets travellers feel as comfortable as locals in destinations. Its platform allows locals to post their experiences. Travellers can easily book their experiences and post travel-related questions directing them to locals of their choice. Also, the website features many categories such as shopping, photograph and nightlife tours.

Language: English

#5 Guiddoo

Founded by Vineet Budki, Nidhi Varma, Darshan Sharma and Prashant Choudhary in 2013, Guiddoo is one-stop shop for travellers willing to indulge in tours, activities, audio-visual travelling, restaurants, spas and shopping. Its mobile app helps the users to enrich their travel experiences. Also, the app allows users to take pictures of point of interests and share it on their social channels.

Language: English

#6 Routofy

Launched by IIT graduates Abhishek Aggarwal and Ronak Gupta last year, Routofy is quite different from other online travel portals. It can search for flights, trains and buses all at once between any two destinations. Direct and indirect connections at cheap rates are displayed to the users from the favourite providers. This unique portal has already received great response from the Indian travel industry and was financially backed last year by the founders of Snapdeal.

Language: English

#7 Nearify

Founded by Mayank Kumar, Saurav Singh and Vivek Srivastava in 2012, Nearify is an event discovery platform that can be used by the travellers in their favourite destinations. It accumulates information of concerts, music festivals, parties, workshops, shows and meet-ups and categorises them according to traveller’s current location, genre of entertainment etc.

Language: English

#8 PressPlay

Launched by two friends Anand Sinha and George Abraham in 2013, PressPlay offers travel entertainment service to tourers. Interested travellers can stream or download movies, music for free under 2 minutes when connected to its hotspot. In buses, the company provides its app on fully-charged tablets for INR 100. Travellers can do away with the boredom they usually experience while travelling anywhere.

Language: English

#9 Byond Travel

Founded by Vikram Ahuja last year, Byond Travel offers 100+ unforgettable travel experiences from 40+ countries. It provides wildlife adventures, houseboat explorations, treks to Himalayas, deep-sea diving in Sri Lanka and many other activities guided by travel adventurers and experts. Byond Travel packages range from Rs. 50,000 to Rs. 1.5 lakh. It has a remarkable collection of travel experiences in its Lime Diaries collective.

Language: English

#10 Padhaaro

Founded by Ish Jindal in 2012, Padhaaro is an on-demand marketplace that connects foreign travellers with Indian locals. It assists travellers right from the time they plan their trips to the time they arrive at the destination. They can book tours and local experiences through it while being on-the-go. This startup believes in improving India’s image in the eyes of the international travellers.

Language: English

Are you a travel startup looking to leave a mark?

If you have an amazing product for the travel industry, don’t miss the chance to showcase at the Startup Knockdown events. Send your pitch deck to editor@travhq.com. Follow the links for more details- Startup Knockdown Mumbai | Startup Knockdown Delhi.

For any queries, drop us a mail at the above email ID or reach us through our social media accounts Facebook | Twitter | LinkedIn.

The post Our pick of India’s 10 coolest travel startups that stole the limelight appeared first on TravHQ.

The much awaited 2-day eTailing and Travel Commerce Conference summit by IAMAI gets underway tomorrow at Hotel Lalit in New Delhi. With a cracking line-up of speakers & panel discussions on some burning topics in the travel industry, the summit holds tremendous promise for all travel marketers, analysts and media fraternity.

TravHQ is the official media supporter for the event and our team will be bringing you the latest news on both days. With less than 24 hours to go for the Conference, here are some key sessions that you should definitely watch-out:

• Our Tourism Ministry has been quite active on the digital front and had launched an Incredible India mobile app last year. Considering that the Incredible India campaign has been offline for quite sometime now, the inaugural session by Guest of Honour, Shri Suman Billa, Jt. Secretary, Ministry of Tourism should give insights into government’s latest initiatives to promote India as a tourist destination

• The morning plenary session, Impact of Travel Market Places for The Online Travel Market boasts of a fantastic line-up of panelists including Sankalp Agarwal, Chief Executive Office of Travel Triangle, Aloke Bajpai, CEO and Co-founder, ixigo, Yogendra Vasupal, Founder and CEO, Stayzilla Deepak Wadhwa, Co-founder, WeAreHolidays. The discussion would focus on building trust & customer retention in the highly challenging online travel space led by instant gratifications.
• For those who love to track emerging travel-startups, the session on Social Travel-How New Age Start-Ups Are Redefining The Travel Industry? is a must attend. The session has Gautam Shewakramani, Founder & CEO, AudioCompass, Paavan Nanda, Co-founder, Zostel & Chitra Gurnani, Co-Founder, Thrillophilia Adventure Tours and Ish Jindal, Co-founder, Padhaaro as panelists.
• We also have a session on Global Expansion In Travel And Hospitality Industry – An Appetite For Growth.
• On Day 2, the session on Social Media Driving Digital Conversations In Tourism And Hospitality Industry will capture the latest trends on how OTAs, online market places and hotels are using Social Media to attract & engage the customers.

That’s not all! Speakers from leading OTAs, Yatra & Cleartrip would be sharing the experience of their respective journeys in the competitive travel landscape. Overall, the summit is a must attend for those who want to stay updated with the latest trends in “Travel & Hospitality” industry.

If you are a Travel brand and have a story to share with us, get in touch with our team at the summit. You can give us a shout-out on our Twitter handle or write at info@travhq.com.

The post eTailing and Travel Commerce Conference Starts Tomorrow, What to Expect appeared first on TravHQ.