Oyo posts 15x growth in booked room nights in Jan-March quarter
Oyo Rooms currently claims to have 68,300 rooms across 5,855 partner hotels in India and targets to triple the inventory by 2016 end
New Delhi: Japan’s telecom and internet group SoftBank in its earnings report on Tuesday said the daily booked room nights for hotel rooms aggregating platform Oyo Rooms has grown 15 times in the quarter ended March 31 as against the same period a year ago.
Softbank backs Oyo and had participated in a $100 million round of funding in the company last year.
Separately, Oyo Rooms (Oravel Stays Pvt. Ltd) said the booked room night transactions stood at 2.3 million in the January-March quarter of 2016. This is an overall number that does not account for the cancellation rates that the company may be witnessing.
The company currently claims to have 68,300 rooms across 5,855 partner hotels in India and targets to triple the inventory by 2016 end.
“We plan to grow deeper in all key business and leisure cities and triple our inventory by December 2016," said Ritesh Agarwal, founder and chief executive officer, Oyo.
Oyo has been operating in more than 170 Indian cities. These include major metros, regional hubs, leisure destinations as well as pilgrimage towns. In January, it started operations in Malaysia, the company’s first venture outside its home market.
Oyo says that 95% of its traffic comes from its own sales channels such as app, web and call centre. The company also pointed to its new initiatives such as Oyo Bazaar, a marketplace for all hotel supplies and Oyo Care, on-demand housekeeping services. However, it did not give further details.
Recently, Oyo started leasing hotels and guest houses under a programme called Oyo Flagship. By exercising complete control over the day-to-day operations of these establishments, the Gurugram-based company intends to improve the consumer experience.
Oyo faces competition from online travel agencies such as MakeMyTrip, Yatra and Goibibo who launched their own budget hotel businesses last year.
Besides Softbank, Oyo is backed by the investors such as Greenoaks Capital, Sequoia Capital and Lightspeed India.
According to the company, 50% of its demand gets driven by mobile channels. It also claims to have over 4.5 million app downloads so far.
Unlock a world of Benefits! From insightful newsletters to real-time stock tracking, breaking news and a personalized newsfeed – it's all here, just a click away! Login Now!