Ibibo Group is an online Indian travel organisation founded in January 2007 by Ashish Kashyap. The company is a subsidiary of MakeMyTrip (MMT) Limited, which owns a 100% stake in Ibibo Group. The group owns the

B2C Direct-to-consumer (DTC or D2C) or business-to-consumer (B2C) is the business model of selling products directly to customers and thereby bypassing any third-party retailers, wholesalers, or middlemen. Direct-to-consumer sales are usually transa ...

online travel aggregator Goibibo, and online bus ticketing platform RedBus.in. On 31 January 2017, MakeMyTrip (MMT) acquired the ibibo Group by purchasing 100% equity interest in the ibibo Group from MIH Internet, an indirect subsidiary of

Naspers Naspers Limited (until 1998 Die Nasionale Pers) is a South African multinational internet, technology and multimedia holding company headquartered in Cape Town. The company has interests in online retail, publishing, real estate, and ventu ...

, pursuant to a Transaction Agreement dated 18 October 2016.

History

Ibibo started as a

social networking service A social networking service (SNS), or social networking site, is a type of online social media platform which people use to build social networks or social relationships with other people who share similar personal or career content, interest ...

in 2007, and later changed to become an

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) refers to commercial activities including the electronic buying or selling products and services which are conducted on online platforms or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile co ...

and travel organisation. In 2009 Goibibo.com was launched.

Acquisition and investments

Bixee

Bixee is a former

job search engine An employment website is a website that deals specifically with employment or careers. Many employment websites are designed to allow employers to post job requirements for a position to be filled and are commonly known as job boards. Other employ ...

for India, and an example of both

vertical search A vertical search engine is distinct from a general web search engine, in that it focuses on a specific segment of online content. They are also called specialty or topical search engines. The vertical content area may be based on topicality, medi ...

and metasearch (not to be confused with Bixby, Samsung's voice assistant). It was launched in late 2005. The company also launched Pixrat, which is a social photo bookmarking service. Bixee was acquired by ibibo, the Indian arm of the South African media giant

, in December 2006.

Goibibo

Goibibo was launched in 2009 and is part of ibibo Group. It was co-founded by Sanjay Bhasin and Vikalp Sahni. Goibibo is India's largest hotels aggregation and also one of the leading air aggregator.

PayU India

In 2011, Ibibo rolled out its

payment gateway A payment gateway is a merchant service provided by an e-commerce application service provider that authorizes credit card or direct payment processing for e-businesses, online retailers, bricks and clicks, or traditional brick and mortar. The ...

innovation called PayU in the Indian market, to permit websites to integrate e-commerce transactions through

online payment An e-commerce payment system (or an electronic payment system) facilitates the acceptance of electronic payment for offline transfer, also known as a subcomponent of electronic data interchange (EDI), e-commerce payment systems have become increa ...

s. With PayU, a business can process payment by using credit cards and

debit card A debit card, also known as a check card or bank card, is a payment card that can be used in place of cash to make purchases. The card usually consists of the bank's name, a card number, the cardholder's name, and an expiration date, on either ...

s (for more than 50 banks), and

online banking Online banking, also known as internet banking, virtual banking, web banking or home banking, is a system that enables customers of a bank or other financial institution to conduct a range of financial transactions through the financial institut ...

for banks including ICICI, HDFC, SBI, and

Axis Bank Axis Bank Limited, formerly known as UTI Bank (1993–2007), is an Indian Multinational corporation, multinational banking and financial services company headquartered in Mumbai. It is India's third largest private sector bank by assets and fo ...

. PayU provides an

API An application programming interface (API) is a connection between computers or between computer programs. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how to build ...

for integration and transaction analytics to improve the speed and security of payment processing. PayU India launched of a first-of-its kind premium deferral payment facility for

consumer A consumer is a person or a group who intends to order, or use purchased goods, products, or services primarily for personal, social, family, household and similar needs, who is not directly related to entrepreneurial or business activities. ...

s 'LazyPay' aimed at those who transact digitally for any amount between ₹500 and ₹2,500 and is an option to pay later.

redbus.in

Redbus.in became a part of ibibo group via a 100% acquisition in June 2013. redBus is India's most popular online bus ticketing platform, both on mobile and on

desktop A desktop traditionally refers to: * The surface of a desk (often to distinguish office appliances that fit on a desk, such as photocopiers and printers, from larger equipment covering its own area on the floor) Desktop may refer to various compu ...

. The business also owns BOGDS, a

cloud computing Cloud computing is "a paradigm for enabling network access to a scalable and elastic pool of shareable physical or virtual resources with self-service provisioning and administration on-demand," according to International Organization for ...

service for bus operators, and SeatSeller, a GDS for bus inventory distribution. redBus has started its carpooling and bike pooling platform called rPool in Delhi.

YourBus

In March 2014, ibibo Group acquired

Bangalore Bengaluru, also known as Bangalore (List of renamed places in India#Karnataka, its official name until 1 November 2014), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the southern States and union territories of India, Indian state of Kar ...

-based bus tracking startup YourBus. YourBus, founded by BITS-Pilani graduates from Rajesh Mallipeddi and Satya Padmanabham in 2011, is a GPS-based bus tracking and

analytics Analytics is the systematic computational analysis of data or statistics. It is used for the discovery, interpretation, and communication of meaningful patterns in data, which also falls under and directly relates to the umbrella term, data sc ...

platform. The YourBus application on a smartphone shows users the location of a bus in real time on a map. It also tells the users about the

arrival time Arrival(s) or The Arrival(s) may refer to: Film * The Arrival (1991 film), ''The Arrival'' (1991 film), an American science fiction horror film * The Arrival (1996 film), ''The Arrival'' (1996 film), an American-Mexican science fiction horror fil ...

at their pick-up point along with

SMS Short Message Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile phones exchange short text messages, t ...

updates.

Djubo

In August 2015 ibibo Group bought a minority stake in cloud-based hotel services startup Djubo for an undisclosed amount. Djubo, founded in February 2015 by Tarun Gulati and Sankalp Goel, manages hotel bookings for over 100 hotels through a single interface.

redbus.pe and redbus.co

In July 2016 Redbus acquired

Peru Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...

-based bus tracking startup Busportal. In 2017, they founded a chapter of Redbus in

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

. The company received ₹10.7 Crores infusion of funding from its

Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...

-based parent company, Ibibo Group Holdings. Prior to this, in November 2019, It had also received ₹71.73 Crores.

MakeMyTrip & Goibibo Group Merger

In October 2016, India based online travel company MakeMyTrip, a Nasdaq listed firm and ibibo Group, India's largest travel group agreed to merge in a stock transaction, to form the country's biggest online travel company. Both these online platforms have AI-powered chatbots named Myra and Gia respectively.

References

External links

* {{official website
Ibibo – overview
on startuptalky.com Internet properties established in 2007 Defunct social networking services Online companies of India Indian travel websites