A bulging middle class, a mega-rich 1%, and a rapidly growing population are swirling to potentially make India a tourism superpower. But the country’s largest online travel agencies are not going to go to war; rather, they’re in a race for who can leverage the growth opportunities first and then on a long-term basis.
“I don’t lose sleep about some competitor doing something for a month,” said Dhruv Shringi, co-founder and CEO of Yatra Online at the Skift India Summit 2024 in Gurugram, India. He said that operators need a long-term plan for growing in India travel. “You need a strategy for long-term retention of customers.”
By 2027, India is slated to become the world’s fifth-largest outbound travel market, and as the world’s most populous country, is on a fast-track to become an immense domestic tourism hub.
Given the sheer size and potential of India tourism, there’s room for multiple competitors, said Rajesh Magow, co-founder and Group CEO of MakeMyTrip. “If…