Taking its competitors like Redbus.in head on, Ahmedabad-based Mantis Technologies, a Centre for Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship (CIIE) incubatee at Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) is launching a new web portal for bus ticketing, 'travelyaari.com'.
Unlike other online portals, travelyaari.com will allow customers to book their own tickets directly. While the portal, to be launched in couple of days, currently contains an inventory of 30-odd bus operators of Gujarat, Mantis is expanding its network to facilitate travellers in other states to use the portal.
Set up by Aurvind Lama, Parthasarathi Sinha, Prateek Nigam and Rajiv Dhamsania, the company is one of the first to implement software as a service (SAAS) model in online ticketing platform for bus industry in India.
"In two years since launch, we have had around three million transactions in online ticketing for bus travel. However, we are moving step ahead by launching another portal called 'travelyaari.com' that will be more interactive and allow customers to book their own tickets in real time. The portal is unlike anything being run by our competitors," said Aurvind Lama, co-founder and director of Mantis Technologies.
Mantis, currently, holds a 60 per cent share in the Rs 4,500 crore private bus operator industry. Recently, Mantis was shortlisted among the top 30 startups for final round of Tata NEN Hottest Startups Awards 2008.
“We are hopeful to reach the top five startups list as well. Being shortlisted for the awards has already boosted our sales network and we expect our national footprint to grow gradually,” said Lama.
With the help of the new portal, Mantis is projecting a turnover of anywhere between Rs 1.5 crore and Rs 2 crore for the financial year 2008-09. The company is also in process of expanding its bus operator network in states like Maharashtra, Karnataka and other southern and western states.