Yesterday, TravelRave kicked off with the WIT Bootcamp and it was quite a day. Successful entrepreneurs sharing their stories to budding entrepreneurs presenting their ideas, there was a little bit of everything and like always, it also featured Start-up Pitch in which the selected startups presented their idea to panel of mentors and investors. The winning team of the startup pitch stands to win prize sponsored by Abacus Ventures.

Here are some of the startups that presented during the WIT Bootcamp that caught our attention:

#1. 42Race

42Race is a platform that would help you plan ‘running vacations’. It focuses on people who travel for marathons across the world and offers one stop portal for the resources they would need. At this point they are focusing on China but plan to expand to other countries soon. They try to bring down the costs for travellers by utilising the volumes and offering customised itineraries tailored around the needs of marathon runners. Website

Zhou Mi, Co-Founder, 42Race

#2. Rimoto

Rimoto tries to address the issue of roaming costs and offers local app based services that are essential to a traveller. These may include cab services, hotel booking, local discovery and other similar services. This works with the help of Rimoto app which will keep running in background and allow partner services to work for free through VPN. Rimoto isn’t available for public yet and will be launched soon. Website

Shashin Shah, Co-Founder, Rimoto

#3. TripBolt

The team at TripBolt plans to bring all the stages of a traveller’s cycle in one place. It is an aggregator for the travel search engines and will offer content to inspire people, help them plan and then eventually book, all in one place. TripBolt isn’t available to public yet and will be launched soon. Website

Hendric Tay, Co-Founder – Tripbolt

#4. Wellobox

Wellobox is a service that offers incentives to hosts of homestays like AirBnb to enhance the experience of guests. They can offer curated local discounts and offers for the guests which in turn will fetch them better reviews and thus drive more guests. Website

Stuart Blitz, Wellobox

#5. Your Local Cousin

Your Local Cousin helps travellers by offering them with a local expert who will connect with them via Skype and create itineraries suitable to them for a small fee. The start up aims to help the travellers when they need information or recommendations at a destination. Website

Kunal Jain, Co-Founder, Your Local Cousin

#6. Kaicar

While self drive car rental is a relatively new concept in India, there are too many rental services in many other countries. Kaicar aggregates multiple car rental providers in one place so that travellers can easily find suitable vehicle from a provider that suits them. The providers get to list at their own prices and pay a small commission on the booking while the customers get to pick the best deals from the ones listed. Kaicar

Kai, Founder & CEO, Kaicar

42Race, Rimoto and Wellobox have been selected to battle it out in the finals of startup pitch on October 21, 2015 during the WIT Conference. To stay updated about all the activities at TravelRave in real time, follow us on Twitter. You can click here for all the other stories from TravelRave.

The post A round-up of Travel Startups from the WIT Bootcamp that caught our eye appeared first on TravHQ.

Last year, WIT conference witnessed the theme of “Little Big 10”, which marked the end of one cycle. This year the most talked travel event is coming back with the theme called “Reboot”. Starting from 19^th October, WIT 2015 Singapore will end on 21^st of October, the event is held to redefine the characters in travel, explore new opportunities in the industry and challenge thinking on the elements that makes the travel more exciting.

The conference includes WIT Bootcamp on 19^th October and the main conference will be held on 20^th and 21^st October. Entering into the 11^th year, the WIT conference will address major questions of how we should restart and discard old thought to renew ideas to win customers.

The conference will bring together top travel experts from travel industry to speak on how to provoke and reboot travel thinking.

WIT Bootcamp- What to look forward for?

The WIT Bootcamp that will be held before the main conference, is the meet & match for start-ups, innovators and investors in the travel industry.  This event will focus on what’s new and hot in the industry shared by like-minded travel professionals.  The event will also be spearheaded by travel entrepreneurs from around the world who will share their success stories and mistakes to build the business.

What will it feature?

• It will feature WIT Start-Up Pitch, in which few selected young entrepreneurs will pitch their business ideas each to the panel of investors and coaches.
• Finalists from this event, will pitch ideas live at the Grand Finale which will be held on 21^st October

The Reboot Theme will examine:

• Before Reboot & After Reboot: Which old ideas should be discarded, which new ideas should to be taken forward?
• Monsters, Copycats and Start- Ups: Who will win and what it takes to win?
• Might Over Smart: As big companies are getting bigger, will there be a room for start-ups?
• The Flip Side: Meeting with the characters we seldom see and to see who are the integral part of our universe
• Winning & Keeping Customers: More than one way to land that prize, and what is the best way?
• The Power of Now: Who will win in the age of instant decision?
• The Next Frontier: Where can one find new opportunities? At Restaurants? In-Destination? Local Transport or Space?
• Personalisation: How will you walk on the thin line between being a friend and nuisance?
• Travel Status: Has technology killed travel star?

Event Programme:

The WIT Bootcamp which will be held on 19^th October, 2015 will take place at Phoenix 2, Level 6, Novotel Clarke Quay Singapore. You can view the entire schedule of the event here.

The WIT Conference which will be held on 20^th & 21^st October, 2015 and will take place at Heliconia Ballroom, Level 3, Marina Bay Sands, Singapore. You can view the entire schedule of the event here.

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