Business
Budget hotel aggregator Oyo Rooms partners with payment solutions company ItzCash
Looking to tap the underserved Indian consumer segment that is almost 500 million in number, budget hotel aggregator Oyo Rooms has partnered with multi-service payment solutions company ItzCash. Consumers can now make effortless payments for hotel bookings through this tie-up across 5500 hotels in over 170 cities in India through ItzCash’s money transfer solutions.
ItzCash’s aggressive plans for hotel bookings continue with this partnership and it aims to double its volume and clock Rs. 400 crore by FY18. It is backed by Lightspeed Ventures, which is also an investor in OYO. ItzCash offers travel booking service through its strong network of 75,000 plus pan-India network of retail touch points.
The partnership will help OYO tap potential consumers who do not have access to either a debit or a credit card.
Ritesh Agarwal, CEO and Founder, OYO, said, “The partnership with ItzCash will enable us to reach the large traveler-base that transacts through offline channels. ItzCash is a trusted partner for these customers and this long-standing association will undoubtedly help them build preference and familiarity with OYO.”
ItzCash is already a dominant player in travel segment, and will offer access to OYO via an online co-branded portal as well as offline outlets. Both partners also have existing synergies such as deep integration with IRCTC.
Travel & Hotel bookings account for 12 – 15 % of ItzCash business and is expected to grow at 60% year-on-year.
Naveen Surya, managing director of ItzCash, said, ”With this integration, we aim to further strengthen ItzCash’s foothold on the digital stage. While we already dominate Rail bookings; our focus in the air and hotel bookings will drive the incremental growth in the next two fiscals for ItzCash.”
The company, which has a customer base of more than 40 million, has crossed Rs 50,000 crore worth of cumulative gross payment volume for all bill payments for the period 2006 to 2016.
