MiStay, an online hotel booking company based out of Bangalore, raises funding from Axilor Ventures and a group of angel investors. MiStay allows booking hotel rooms by pack of hours with flexible check-in/ check-out times. The funds will be utilized in growing the team, marketing and scaling up operations across India. MiStay was part of Axilor’s Winter ’16 accelerator batch.

Founded in 2016 by IIT Madras alumni, Sandeep Jaiswal and Pranav Prabhakar, MiStay is currently operational in 30 cities with around 400 hotels, with the largest network of hotels in Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai. The partner hotels of MiStay include various branded hotel chains such as The Park Hotels, Pride Hotels, Sarovar Hotels, Keys Hotels, Treebo Hotels and Mango Hotels.MiStay’s customer base has grown 7 times in last 6 months.

“We have seen an overwhelming traction from hotel partners as well as customers in a year. While the hotels are seeing significant impact in their revenue by optimizing their room inventory though MiStay, the end users find the MiStay product useful because of the flexibility they get to book hotels only for the hours they require. The focus now is on rapid expansion and growth, while keeping the customer experience intact”, said Sandeep, the co-founder & CEO at MiStay.

MiStay team post the funding

“We are excited to have Axilor Ventures and other investors including some hospitality industry veterans join us, and we are looking forward to leverage their collective experience”, he added.

While the hotel booking market is crowded with various players, the unique model which differentiates MiStay from other players is its’ slot-wise hotel booking system. A full day is divided into 3 smaller slots: morning (8:00 am – 11:00 am), day (12:00 noon – 7:00 pm) and night (8:00 pm – 7:00 am), and one can book any combination of consecutive slots based on their need, including multiple day bookings. Additionally, MiStay partners with only a curated set of hotels identified based on several factors such as hotel location, online rating and customer reviews, hotel amenities, staff behaviour and others. Majority of partner hotels of MiStay are located in transit areas, such as hotels near airports, railway stations, bus stations or at the business hubs of the city.

Asutosh Upadhyay, Head of Programs at Axilor said, “MiStay has taken a very innovative and customer-centric approach to hotel bookings, which is reflected in the fast paced growth they have seen since the launch. While giving travelers the best options, they are unlocking value in hotel inventory, making this a win-win solution for individuals and corporates. Axilor is happy to be backing this enthusiastic team with the vision to change the way the hotel industry operates today.”

In a move towards increased focus on mobile, MiStay had launched its’ android version of the hotel booking app earlier this year. MiStay had also introduced ‘MiStay for Business’ – a product designed for corporates to manage employees’ hotel accommodation needs by pack of hours. With this product, corporates can reduce their expenses on hotel booking by upto 40%, claims the company.

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StayAbode is a Bengaluru based startup providing affordable co-living spaces. We spoke to the founding team and learnt more about the startup.

1. Can you tell us about yourself and what made you start StayAbode.
Prior to co-founding StayAbode, I worked at Roadrunnr (later rebranded as Runnr) where I worked on various growth initiatives before heading marketing for their B2C platform Runnr. Runnr was an extremely fast paced organisation that taught me how to execute with speed which was of great help when we started StayAbode.

Varun, my other co-founder, was with Treebo Hotels where he oversaw mobile development and had earlier co-founded Bribe Me, a flash sale marketplace. That experience has helped Varun who is now building our technology.

Devashish handled operations at Roadhouse Hostels and prior to that was in finance. He uses his experience and looks after finance for us. Having stayed in backpacker hostels and been a part of setting up backpacker hostels in India, he felt that people live better, have better experiences and save more when they share spaces. What also stood out for him was the fact that the liberty to live freely and with convenience makes the living experience a whole lot better. The inspiration for the idea, in a nutshell, is an aspect of celebrating individuality with a sense of belongingness.

It’s a concept focused on fostering a sense of community, of living together, of sharing space, costs, resources and time with like-minded people. StayAbode has a host of interest-based socializing spaces in their properties to build a strong community. From a cozy reading nook to a community music zone complete with a guitar and speakers, we’ve thoughtfully built these zones to create a conducive environment for people to interact and socialize.

2. When did the company start its operations, how big is the team?
The company began its operation in August 2016. We are currently 25 people strong. We have over 310 units available across 6 properties in Bangalore.

3. Your company claims to enhance the stay experience of guests. Who are you targeting?
We are targeting urban millennials – who move to different cities for jobs or study and are looking for affordable yet high quality living experience. StayAbode offers a great co-living experience by offering exactly that, along with an opportunity to instantly connect with likeminded people. Communal living is gradually becoming the preferred way of living for several reasons – saves money, is more fulfilling than living alone, people want to make/have friends to share common interests with, people want to live a less atomized lifestyle, easier to move in when shifting to a new city.

4. Who are your current customers?
As mentioned above, urban millennials.

5. What is your revenue model?
We work in partnership with real estate developers to lease buildings and in turn rent out spaces. We are an asset light business.

6. Who are your key competitors/How big is this market?
The rental real estate market is highly unorganised with the lack of any brand with significant market share. It is estimated that there are over 2.5 cr rented homes in urban India alone. The biggest player in the space holds lesser than 0.1% market share from this perspective.

7. Are you bootstrapped/funded
We were initially bootstrapped. StayAbode raised angel funding, in February this year from a consortium of investors led by Ishan Manaktala and Angie Mahtaney. Gaurav Bhalotia (Ex-VP Engineering, Flipkart), Vishal Lulla (CEO, VIshal Exports) and a group of Investors from Lets Venture also participated in the round followed by a strategic investment in August this year from a consortium of investors led by Legacy Global Projects MD Sanjay Shenoy and Mridul Upreti (ex Joint MD JLL India).

8. Which startups inspire you – Inside/Outside travel industry
One company that inspires me and the entire team at StayAbode is Tesla. Their vision to drive the world’s transition to electric vehicles backed by consistent breakthrough developments in the field of sustainable transportation is what inspires us to work towards building a more sustainable future for the urban millennials of India.

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Today, we are profiling Companyon, a travel networking platform where you can connect to your co-travellers prior to the journey. Companyon connects people over international, domestic as well as local journeys. Now travellers can make their travel time productive by making great professional and personal connections. Its a novel idea, which adds social layer on top of travel.

How we started
While the company was registered in August, 2016, App went live in March, 2017. Team is based out of Gurgaon, India.

What is our user growth like
App has more than 5,000 unique users and sees daily engagement of over 20,000. Product observes strong retention rate of over 60% and aims to get over 25,000 users(for it’s stand alone app) by the end of 2017.

We aren’t bootstrapped 
Company has raised angel investment through HNIs.

The crux of the problem we are solving
Daily commute and travel continues to be a major problem for urban population. People tend to spend more than 80 mins. one side while commuting. This problem could be eradicated if people start to use the networking opportunities while traveling and grow their network personally as well as professionally. For eg. In a city like Tokyo, more than 8 mn people and in New Delhi more than 5 mn people commute daily via Metro train. There is immense possibility of networking while commute. Both as a commuter and platform user, we realized the problems of wasting time during commute. A major reason why millennials and office goers are leading a stressful time even beyond their office/college hours is long and solo commuting hours. Companyon is a tailor-made solution for daily commuters, where they can find companions, make new friends and connections and eventually travel together.

For Business/Air Travelers, we are working on our SaaS product which will carry a set of APIs that can be integrated with OTA (Online Travel Agents) applications thus adding a layer of social on top of their current travel offering. This value add would allow people to find, network and connect with other air travellers thus helping them make most of their time spent at the airport and while flying.

Main Features

• Find Your Companion: Browse through the list of people travelling on the same route as yours. Companyon comes with the flexibility to view travellers across different modes of transport thus proving to be a versatile search platform.
• In-app Chat Box: Engage in conversation with the suggested user through in-app chat box.
• Airport Connect: You can meet new people at the airport post check-in and expand your network irrespective of the itineraries. Get real-time location of your potential connections through Airport Connect feature.
• Online Check-in: Use this feature to do hassle free online check-in for your flights. Online check-in available across carriers such as Air India, Air Costa, AirAsia, Air Vistara, SpiceJet, IndiGo, Jet Airways, GoAir etc.

Companyon Co-Founders

Our revenue model
Companyon is planning to make money by 3 ways:
1. Our B2B SaaS model will be our major source of revenue.
2. In-app user friendly advertisements
3. Ancillary revenue through affiliate partnerships with Airport Retailers, Duty Free Shops and Local Discovery Platforms

About Our Team

Parth Shrivastava- Parth is an IIT Hyderabad pass-out. He completed his minor degree in Entrepreneurship and carries expertise in Digital Marketing and UI/UX. Parth has worked as a digital marketer in an AI based company prior to starting up.

Mayur Misra- Mayur is a 2012 engineering graduate from SRM University, Chennai. After working for 2+ years in RBS as a Corporate Banker, he joined a hyperlocal handyman services startup and handled the operations for over 9 months, before starting up Companyon.

Shivam Lohtia- Shivam is a 2014 Computer Science Graduate from IIT Hyderabad. He is a hardcore techie who has worked with E-Comm. company- SnapDeal as a Software Developer for over 2 years before starting up.

The post Companyon is a Linkedin/Tinder platform for travellers appeared first on TravHQ.

We spoke to Larry Chua, who is the co-founder at Caption Hospitality an Indonesian travel startup providing easy to use solutions (such as Point of Sales, Central Reservation System) for hotels.

On growth in the Indonesian Travel Industry
Firstly travel scene is a big word, a better way to address this is breaking down into sub sectors of travel. In a whole the travel industry is growing within Indonesia.

Government initiatives: The ministry of tourism has high targets to attract 20 million inbound travelers into indonesia. One initiatives is ITX , a collaboration project with Telkom Indonesia which dominates infrastructural of the nation. ITX was a very big ambition with the objective of trying to digitalise the travel industry by providing an Eco System.

Distribution

With recent events of investment and acquisition news, I feel that the Online Travel Agent space is almost reaching its peak in Indonesia. Clear dominant players will remain and the rest will eventually fall out of the space. However, I will not be surprised to see new players expanding their vertical into the travel distribution.

E-commerce companies such as Bukalapak and Tokopedia will start moving into this space and also will not be surprise that another unicorn such as Gojek will start to play within this space. These are very gradual moves when your company controls huge amount of customer database. The next question is what can i sell these customers which yields the most margins and the highest ticket item. Lastly, travel products does not require actual storage of inventories.

Larry Chua, Co-Founder Caption Hospitality

On travel startups
Indonesian travel startups – The strongest contested space within indonesia is the “Virtual Hotel Operator” space, with companies such as Nidarooms, Zenrooms, Reddoors, Zuzuhotels, Tinggal, Airyrooms. Questions lies within the true value of such model as we have witness similar trends and sagas with OYO in India. Will this model prove to be successful and sustainable is a question mark?

For other travel startups to survive, they have to look deeper within travel industry or find a huge niche market. There are many areas that have yet to be disrupted or evolved such as Technology solutions support travel industry, Corporate travel industry, MICE industry etc.

Current Challenges

Geographical – Different cities are at different level of credit card penetration, consumer spending and understanding of technology. Indonesia has many islands which makes conquering the whole market a challenge if without networks within that region.

Educating the market – Most suppliers of travel business are still very much traditional and don’t feel a need to evolve with technology.Too few trying other areas of travel – Very common suspects of ideas or business. Some will still try to do OTA model, Trip planning, Airbnb similar. Few look deeper at problems within the industry.Investors knowledge within the other sectors of travel apart from distribution.

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Life has thrown many challenges at Matthew Chow, a Hong Kong based entrepreneur who has spent the last decade of his life caring for his autistic son. Last month we had talked about his wireless charging wallet. Since then, GOQI’s wireless charging travel wallet has been fully funded on Indiegogo, with the company managing to raise funds in excess of $31,000.

Excerpts from our recent conversation with Matthew:

On manufacturing trends

From his learning in the past couple of years, he believes four main issues face Hong Kong manufacturers, wholesalers & retailers. A strong USD relative to the RMB which leads tourist away from HK to Europe, Japan & Korea. The anti-corruption drive from Beijing, leading to fewer investments in the region. The anti-mainland Chinese tourist sentiment, which with modern social media has created an anti-HongKong sentiment with Chinese travellers. The general weakness in retail demand in main world markets, such as USA, Europe & Japan. With these recent issues, Matthew believes in the future of fashion tech for traditional businesses leading into the future, and with the IOT(internet of things) and big data boom soon to hit us, there is no better time and place to engage in this sector.

On GOQI

GOQI was established in 2015 to keep travellers charged and organised at all times, wirelessly. A cable free life is not a dream, but now a reality. He believes that in 5 to 10 years time most wires will be removed from our lives. GOQI wallets enable travellers to be organised and charged at all times, wirelessly. With the explosion of tech gadgets on the market, GOQI will be the source of their power when their batteries run out. All new tech is useless when their batteries die.

On success with Indiegogo

IGG experience was nerve wrecking but a good learning experience. He did not go through an agency and did not know that he should have started to market the idea at least a month before the launch to ensure he had enough buyers the first day to pretty much hit his target.

On funding goals

He has been self funded to date but looking to get investment to help scale up the production of the wallets quickly. He has learnt from RISE 2016 that since GOQI is more hardware tech solution, he would be best served to find strategic partners who can can help him scale up production and marketing, as opposed to a software startup which VC companies can flip for a profit in a couple of years. GOQI is solving a few serious issues with the travel and fashion market so we need the right support of cash and experience.

On personal challenges

For my self the past 10 years has been a major personal challenge, with the realisation that his son is autistic and will most likely require continuous care for the rest of his life. The realisation that a beautiful young boy will be challenged the rest of his life with the internal struggles of this condition. The family struggles to ensure his life is as happy as possible.

On the road ahead

As a young startup GOQI is seeking fair and suitable partners to help with future funding & experience for the production, distribution, marketing, sales and after sales service of the collection around the world.

Matthew Chow at the RISE Conference 2016 in Hong Kong

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Hong Kong’s rise & rise on the world startup map has been quite astounding. The country’s developed infrastructure is a great platform for passionate entrepreneurs to setup their teams from the region. Klook.com and the relatively newer ones such as Sam the Local are few Travel Startups from Hong Kong that are doing quite well.

The much awaited StartmeupHK Festival 2016 will be hosted by Invest Hong Kong (InvestHK) as part of the department’s ongoing initiative to promote the city as one of the fastest growing start-up hubs in the world.

InvestHK’s StartmeupHK Festival will be organised between January 23 and 30 2016

The festival which is being organised from January 23 and 30, 2016 will witness leading accelerators, corporates and associations hold a series of thematic conferences and pitching events covering areas such as the Internet of things (IoT), financial technology (fintech), health technology and data analytics, in which Hong Kong has a distinct competitive advantage.

This festival will attract thousands of international and local start-ups, investors and business leaders to converge in Hong Kong.

The Director-General of Investment Promotion, Dr Simon Galpin, said that InvestHK’s StartmeupHK Festival aims at showcasing the dynamism and growth of Hong Kong’s start-up ecosystem to both international and domestic audiences.

According to a latest survey by InvestHK,the number of co-working spaces and incubators in Hong Kong has topped 40 and the number of start-ups operating within these affordable premises has increased by 46 per cent in comparison to the last year.

In addition to the core events, the week will feature social mixers, roundtable discussions and investor group meet-ups in venues across Hong Kong.

More details about the StartmeupHK Festival 2016 are available on InvestHK’s dedicated start-up website www.startmeup.hk, with hyperlinks for further details of the core events. The StartmeupHK site also offers a one-stop portal to the start-up community in the city, listing the latest start-up events and signposting visitors to resources such as government funding schemes and incubation programmes.

About InvestHK

InvestHK is the Department of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government established in July 2000 to attract foreign direct investment and support overseas and Mainland businesses to set up or expand in Hong Kong. It provides free advice and customised services to help businesses succeed in Hong Kong’s vibrant economy. As at June 2015, InvestHK had assisted over 3,700 companies which have created more than 40,200 new jobs in the first year of operation or expansion and over HK$99 billion of investment. For more information, please visit www.investhk.gov.hk.

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If you have been following the Travel Startups section on TravHQ, by now you would have observed that the online travel industry isn’t just about the OTAs & Airbnbs of the world. There are many travel startups that are shaking various segments of the industry such as trip planning services, hotel bookings apps or even exploring offbeat destinations with locals.

We interacted with an exciting lineup of travel startups on Day 1 at RISE 2015. Our experience on Day 2 with few others, further echoes our belief that this industry is poised to grow at a revolutionary pace, faster than one would imagine.

These startups are solving unique problems either on the consumer side or on the business side. Like most startups, this ride is not going to be a cakewalk as they will face questions about scale, competition and even whether consumer actually needs their services. However, events like RISE, do provide the right platform for these startups to do a self check, understand what they are doing right or wrong with mentorship from peers in the industry. We are enthralled to have connected with so many young startups who are determined to make it big. We have interviewed many of them on Periscope and will very soon have a YouTube feed for you.

Here is a round-up of the travel startups we met on the Day 2 of the RISE Conference.

Singapore based travel startup Travelog offers smart mobile city guides to plan your trips

Hotel Quickly saves travellers time and money by offering dynamic deals at the best hotels in Asia-Pacific

Ireland’s Weestay is a mash-up of CouchSurfing + Airbnb with no cost. In a nutshell, it helps you to find free stay.

Singapore’s Nothing to Hide wants to revolutionise the untapped hotel review segment by providing hoteliers free WiFi in exchange for hotel reviews.

Operating from Hong Kong, Klook is your gateway to find out the best activities to do in Asia.

We will be digging into some of these startups, taking them for a spin and come back with our detailed review sometime soon.

For those who missed the RISE Conference this year, here is why you should definitely attend the next one in 2016 and the Web Summit later this year.

• RISE is your passport to meet like-minded folks such as investors, mentors, potential job seekers and competing startups and the media to share your story  In addition, such events give you the perfect opportunity to identify right partners with whom you can explore collaboration and expand your array of services.
• Other than the exhibiting startups, there are separate tracks such as the Marketing track, Development track and more depending on your industry interests. While 2 days aren’t enough, try to learn and absorb as much as you can.
• Post event networking parties are again a great way to meet more people and talk over some drinks.
• Lastly, it happens in Hong Kong which is located just about 5 hours from India

You can find more updates from RISE here.

The post We are in love with RISE Conference & these Travel Startups appeared first on TravHQ.

In a bid to bite a bigger share in the fast growing travel market, MakeMyTrip has undergone some major changes in the past few months. They added new features like uncancel, introduced new brand tagline, joined hands with travel bloggers, invested in startups and hosted contests. The recent acquisition of MyGola is a piece in the larger picture MakeMyTrip is trying to paint.

After floating around in different flavours over the years, the last minute booking service MyGola has been acquired by the Indian OTA MakeMyTrip. The company started as a platform for travellers to get their questions about destinations and travel expenses answered by experts. Then they scaled up their services and started offering travel itineraries based on expert opinions. After this they pivoted into an app which would allow users to find and book ‘to-dos’ based on their taste.

With its current model, MyGola gets a good number of conversions and handsome margins on the transactions. They moved away from the earlier models to increase conversion rate. Initially their users were using the platform for researching but not for booking. Now however a large number of users book through the app. Anshuman Bapna, co-founder of MyGola says that the last minute travel planning space is easy to monetize due to the sense of urgency of users.

Before being acquired by MakeMyTrip, MyGola secured USD 1 million from 500 Startups founder Dave McClure and few other investors. Later it raised another USD 1.5 million in Series A funding led by Helion Venture Partners. MakeMyTrip hasn’t disclosed details of the deal. The MyGola team will now continue as a part of MakeMyTrip.

MakeMyTrip recently has been undergoing multiple changes this year

MakeMyTrip functions in a space where it has to fight many other OTAs and it operates on high volumes and slim margins (around 8 percent). On top of that, price competitiveness curbs brand loyalty in the space where MakeMyTrip is fighting. MyGola on the other hand, charges 5-10 percent from tourist attractions or service providers on bookings through their app and another 5 percent from users. Their model is more profitable and can generate very good revenues on scaling up even further.

But that wouldn’t have been the primary objective behind the move. MyGola has an expertise in the mobile technology space and their product showcases it well. The algorithms take care of all factors like open/close hours, personal interests and transport options to yield the perfect results. We all know the industry is shifting towards mobile and the skills of MyGola team would surely come in handy for MakeMyTrip. Rajesh Magow, co-founder and CEO, MakeMyTrip India said, “The MyGola team’s deep understanding of travellers’ planning and in-destination experience preferences will be valuable in strengthening our proposition”

MyGola shared this hilarious video of their journey so far. It surely is worth a watch.

Other travel brands are also bringing mobile technology experts onboard. HolidayIQ recently acquired SourceN to beef up mobile offerings. What is your opinion about MakeMyTrip’s move?

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