MakeMyTrip announces an institution of USD 15 million, to support early stage start-ups in travel space, in the country.
Not long after ecommerce giant Snapdeal announced to launch its own mobile focused incubator and seed fund to encourage ecommerce and m-commerce start-ups in India, MakeMyTrip announced an institution of USD 15 million, to support early stage start-ups in travel space, in the country.
The travel space fund will focus on start-ups in Travel technology with a special focus on mobile and IP based companies. One of the first travel portals in India, MakeMyTrip was founded in the year 2000, and presently holds a 47% market share (as per a study conducted in 2013) in the online travel industry in India.
“The initiative is an additional prong of our inorganic growth strategy of pursuing M&A opportunities in the travel technology space. We intend to purposefully go out and look for such companies and take early stage positions”, says Deep Kalra, Founder and Group CEP, MakeMyTrip. The MakeMyTrip board has approved the formation of an investment committee to set up funds as per its decision of funding various start-ups and mid size companies in the travel and tourism sector in India.
Of late every major internet company in India is making an attempt to gain complete dominance in their respective sectors, by launching incubators and funding early stage start-ups. Apart from the big three players in the industry- MakeMyTrip.com, Yatra.com, and Cleartrip.com, many new players have been putting up their deals in the travel and tourism sector.
Though the online travel industry in India has been growing rapidly since the year 2005 (the year when MMT was launched in India), the industry is yet to consolidate and mature.
