Page 41 - The 10 Most Innovative Startups in Travel 2019
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• Founded in: 2015-2016
• Founding Members: Varun
players in every vertical as well as Innovative Offerings Gupta, Manu Chauhan (1
st
small & large player at different On the consumer side , we employee)
levels of technology adoption and accomplish different things
sophistication. While getting over for different people who are at • Office Locations: Bengaluru
the “this won’t work” mindset of different points in their travel • Company Strength: 10
consumers and travellers is the search journey. For some,
challenge, there are early adopters contextual inspiration is a delight • Total Funding: ~$550,000
(both in other travel companies (and is also the most heavily from marquee angel investors
and consumers directly) who are shared page). For some, the fact with travel, tech and product
genuinely excited by the prospect that the entire trip has been put expertise.
of the product becoming the global together is great. For still others,
leader in applied AI-driven search. the fact that after they’ve got a • Website: https://www.
Sustaining Excellence plan, they don’t need to go from metripping.com
Our primary focus is on helping site to site looking for the lowest
you make the best travel decision prices, is a great help to get to
with help from our ranked bookings. players to provide a much-needed
recommendations for any element Similarly, on the partnerships solution through their platforms as
of the trip that you are looking for with other travel companies well.
– be it the destination, the flight, where we power a part of their
the accommodation or activities. platform, there are customers We are competing with Google,
We are the first & only company in who are only looking to add not Makemytrip and on product
the world an engagement layer on top of innovation, not just on business
model.
1. ranking destinations for their existing product – that’s Building Solutions for Sellers
where our Contextual Inspiration
different experience themes product works best for them.
2. That has different flight Then there are those who are MeTripping is taking the industry
from a seller of static ‘travel-expert’
rankings for different users looking for Pathfinder, our built solutions to solutions built
based on their specific trip inspiration + dynamic packaging using crowd-sourced information
context. product, powering their holiday’s on all pieces that matter for your
3. To rank hotels with section. Each company has travels. MeTripping also cuts
‘locational relevance’ being its own goals and Pathfinder through the noise created by an
a key factor, including an is comprehensive enough and overload of information by making
understanding of a city to flexible enough to cater to all of sense of all kinds of data that
a level on whether location those business and innovation influences your travel decision. It is
itself is important in that goals of its customers. the search engine to make the best &
destination or not. Strategies and Solutions contextually-relevant decisions, not
4. Ranking & scheduling For the solution that we’ve just find a deluge of information.
recommended activities built, we don’t think there’s a The rudder of MeTripping
within each traveler’s competitor globally and we are
budget across the trip receiving acknowledgment of Once the solution reached a certain
duration. that through the clients we have maturity level, we realised that the
Finally, MeTripping is the first and the conversations we’ve had pain point of a travel agent is very
similar to that of a DIY consumer.
& only company in the world with ecosystem partners in other How do I bring all the pieces that
putting together all of these pieces parts of the world. matter in a manner that makes
dynamically in a completely Having said that, travel is sense? Any human can only have
unbiased, consumer-centric certainly a noisy space --- our reasonably details knowledge at a
manner. path to success will be through point in time (even that knowledge
The IP for all of it has been a great ‘search’ experience. gets stale and needs to be refreshed).
developed internally, and we are Consequently, as a search The Pathfinder product developed
currently keeping it as a trade- platform, we believe the solution by us helps them get the most up to
secret – we have not filed for deserves more attention than date and relevant information and
patents on any of them yet and purely fighting out with the big gives the tools to become destination
don’t intend to in the near term. (and small) players. Therefore, experts for their clients in no time.
we are partnering with those
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