Travel eCommerce Firm, Travelspice, Raises First Round from Eagle10 Ventures

Travelspice, India's only travel e-commerce platform where customer decides price she wants to pay for a hotel room, today closed early stage funding from Eagle10 Ventures.

Travelspice works with 3 star to 5 star hotels in more than 212+ cities across India and 6 cities outside India, helping them to reduce the loss of their revenues while at the same time giving travellers the best hotel deals.

Pramod Dsouza, co-founder of Eagle10 Ventures said, "The travel market in India is set to grow exponentially and we feel Travelspice through their opaque platform has the potential to capture a good chunk of this market. At Eagle10 Ventures, our focus is to invest in startups having 10x growth potential and Travelspice is a perfect example of that. Their business model is a win-win model for both end-customers who are looking at quality hotels at lower than market rates, and for hotels which are looking at increasing their occupancy constantly. Travelspice team lead by Ramu has delivered strong results over past 4-5 quarters validating their model. The team is very lean and very innovative when it comes to feature delivery."

All one needs to do is, open its app, pick the city, decide the price she wants to pay for a particular area, star rating, pay upfront and get confirmation in one of the listed 5 star to 3 star hotels in that star category and area in less than 3 hours. All hotels on Travelspice platform have a quality rating of greater than 3.5 on TripAdvisor.

"The double low price guarantee that comes with all hotel deals on Travelspice platform assures the best value to customers. So if a customer can find the same hotel accommodation anywhere else at lesser price, he or she can get double the price difference back as refund," said co-founder of Travelspice, Ramu Kallepalli. A serial entrepreneur, Kallepalli has founded 2 other startups based in Chicago and Hyderabad, before successfully exiting them to start Travelspice.

The startup mainly targets brand agnostic and value conscious consumers and provides them with guaranteed discounts on their hotel bookings. Hotels benefit as they can fill their perishable room inventories with fully paid and non-refundable customers on Travelspice platform without tarnishing their brand and without cannibalising their existing sales channels. This also allows them to white label their perishable inventory.

Hyderabad-based TravelSpice is India’s First Opaque and Map Based Hotel Booking Platform

Now travelers can enjoy their stay at star rated hotels without cutting a hole in their pockets. Hyderabad-based TravelSpice is offering value deals on a hotel stay nationally and internationally. The startup claims to provide up to 70 per cent savings on amazing hotels in 210+ Indian cities with free breakfast plus other exclusive offerings. Travelers can bid online for free with no hidden charges. They can do bookings on their own only if they like the available options. According to Ramu Kallepalli, Co-Founder, TravelSpice, "We are spreading happiness to the world and bringing unique culture through our exceptional products and offerings. We endeavor user-friendly hotel bookings with the best deals at lowest rates."

TravelSpice was founded by Ramu Kallepalli and Prashant Mitta in 2007. Prashant Mitta Co-Founder, TravelSpice adds, "We are happy that our idea is recognized by the industry and countries best hotels who are associated with us to sell their unreserved inventory with no changes in the prices of other traditional sales channels."

Who is Making the Idea a Reality?

TravelSpice was founded by Ramu Kallepalli and Prashant Mitta after years of experience in different industries. Ramu Kallepalli has done his MS engineering from Montana State University, Bozeman, MT and MBA (Finance, Marketing, and Strategy) from University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Before launching this concept he has worked as Practice Manager in Oracle Corporation Consulting organization managing their Oracle ERP performance architecture group in Chicago. Prashant Mitta is taking care of supplier relations & oversees day-to-day operations of TravelSpice. He has over than 17 years of experience in Business Management, Marketing, Operations & Project Delivery experience with P & L responsibility in Information Technology & E-commerce space.

An Exciting Online Booking Platform

TravelSpice is India's 1st opaque and map based hotels booking platform that offers customers the freedom to do bookings in 3/4/5 star rated hotels across the country at the prices of their choice. The platform is based on a new age technology and service disruption to fulfill the demands of customers including affordability, aspiration, and availability etc. Kallepalli adds, “There is no other hotel booking portal like us. Customers can save up to 70 percent in addition to the regular discounts. This makes us one of the favourite online hotel booking platforms in India". It is true that TravelSpice is a novel technique of online hotel bookings for an unforgettable experience.

Unique Business Concept

How does TravelSpice work? Well, the concept of business is very simple and unique all along fulfilling common man's dream to stay at a luxury hotel at lowest prices ever. The startup has created a fascinating business model and a win for everyone including customer, hotels and itself. It secures a specific commission for each booking instead of taking a different amount of user bid and hotel bid. The startup is providing rooms to the guests at star rated hotels just by using unsold and perishable inventory. For bookings, customers need to bid first. Once the booking is confirmed customers can enjoy all the benefits for their desired bookings. Kallepalli adds, “We leverage customers to stay at high demand location across the country and some of the high demand locations in the world.”

Market Opportunity and Challenges

According to an ICRA report, "The domestic hotel industry is estimated to touch $1.8 billion by 2017, which was $0.8 billion in 2016, buoyed by a rise in online bookings.” But, in reality, the market scenario is totally different. Most of the hotels are in huge losses due to unsold inventories. There are abundant figures which are strong enough to dismiss the estimated figures. Not only the hotels but customers are also facing obstacles as they don’t have bargaining power. TravelSpice has only fully paid customers with the non-cancellation option. It connects customers directly to the to Hotels through a mobile app so that they can sell their perishable inventory without lowering prices through other traditional sales channels.

Geared Up To compete Successfully

Unlike other online platforms, TravelSpice divulge's the identity of the hotel prior confirming the booking and thereby ensuring transparency in the entire booking procedure for a greater customer contentedness. Other online platforms like goibibo, yatra.com, and makemytrip.com, etc. don’t disclose the name of the hotel until it is purchased. “We are not directly competing with these companies as their businesses are based on different models and also their target audience is completely unlike,” Kallepalli adds. Find My Stay has the same business concept like TravelSpice but their process is different and it is time-consuming too.

TravelSpice is looking for avenues to raise funds as they want to scale faster but for aggressive marketing and expansion, they lack funds. Since 2007, the startup has remained bootstrapped with a self-funding option. It has overpowered all the challenges successfully but bootstrapping is not at a good option for businesses like this who are in B2C and want to scale faster.

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