The Economic Times:Indian online travel app Ixigo files for an IPO in India to raise $200M+, sources say at a valuation of about $850MMumbai: Travel booking app ixigo is looking to raise Rs 750 crore through a primary fundraise and Rs 850 crore via an offer for sale (OFS) from existing investors as part
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ixigo in ‘wait and also watch mode’ for Rs 1,600-crore IPO

Online travel aggregator ixigo, which received a regulative nod for its proposed Rs 1,600-crore IPO in December in 2014, is still in a ‘wait and view setting’ for its public market launching even as the start-up reported a 184% y-o-y boost in income from procedures for the financial year ended March 2022.

Aloke Bajpai, Group chief executive officer & founder of ixigo, told FE in an interaction that the travel aggregator’s IPO authorization from markets regulator Sebi is valid up until December 2022.

“We are presently dealing with the timing of the IPO, which depends upon how conducive the (travel) market is in the following few months. We have been encouraged by our bankers to kind of wait on the correct time and as and also when we are suggested to go ahead, that’s when we will certainly continue. So it will certainly be challenging to lead on any type of timeline instantly,” stated Bajpai.

According to the company’s DRHP, the issue comprises a fresh problem of equity shares worth Rs 750 crore as well as an offer for sale (OFS) of up to Rs 850 crore. The OFS consist of sales of up to Rs 50 crore each by Bajpai and also Rajnish Kumar, Rs 550 crore by Saif Allies India IV and also Rs 200 crore by Micromax Informatics. Currently, Bajpai holds 9.18%, Rajnish Kumar 8.79%, SAIF Allies 23.97% as well as Micromax 7.61% stake in the firm.

Bajpai added throughout the meeting that the business is ‘adequately well utilized’ and also has enough runway to support operations for the direct future without a demand to elevate additional funding anytime soon.

“We have actually not been type of making any cash money losses therefore in a material way a minimum of in the last 3 years. For the moment, we are completely well capitalised. For us, any kind of fresh financing will largely be used for growth and also searching for new acquisition and financial investment possibilities,” included Bajpai.

In FY22, ixigo reported Rs 451.51 crore in earnings from operations, which is up by 184% y-o-y compared to Rs 158.84 crore in the previous fiscal year. The firm reported a bottom line of Rs 21.09 crore in FY22, although it reported an earnings of Rs 7.53 crore in the previous year. ixigo’s Ebitda loss for FY22 went to Rs 6.95 crore as compared to a favorable Ebitda of Rs 6.14 crore in the previous year.

The business said that an excellent piece of its future revenue is expected ahead from smaller towns as well as cities which are increasingly resorting to online travel and ticketing platforms to get both bus and also train tickets. In FY19, FY20 and also FY21, the percent of transactions booked via ixigo’s OTA (online travel collector) systems, where either an origin or destination was a non-tier-I city were 83.89%, 87.48% and 92.60%, specifically.

“Users in tier-II, III, IV markets have actually been a lot more durable while showcasing greater need after the travel section bounced post the second wave. A lot of their reservations were made throughout either trains as well as buses which are now running in nearly full capacities, especially those running to smaller sized tier towns,” claimed Bajpai.

The start-up had actually made 2 acquisitions lately, consisting of cash and also stock purchase of bus ticketing platform Abhibus in August 2021, as well as train ticketing system Confirmtkt in February 2021. Since March 2022, ixigo claimed to have actually touched 5 million daily energetic customers cumulatively across ixigo trains, ixigo flights, Confirmtkt, and also AbhiBus applications as well as web sites.

It additionally crossed 8.47 million monthly downloads as well as 55.45 million month-to-month energetic users in the month of March 2022.
This summer, the friendliness market’s budget-friendly deluxe 4-5 celebrity resorts and hotels have actually seen development in demand of as much as 2x of pre-pandemic, however budget hotels have actually not seen that type of momentum returning, according to Bajpai. He included that FY23 will likely witness growth for the market as company and SME travellers have actually come back into the system.

Nevertheless, the current air travel hike because of rising oil rates has actually driven consumers in the direction of trains as well as buses, which have revealed remarkable development during the last 2 years.

“Indian aeronautics has actually seen a 40% increase in domestic airfares as well as 70-80% increase in worldwide prices on some routes this summer. Many airlines are not also running their fleets to their complete toughness. India’s airline company market bounced back in Q1 FY23 however our data evaluation reveals that the variety of air tourists was still around a 3.65 lakh each day degree– less than the pre-pandemic figure of around 4.1 lakh,” said Bajpai.

Introduced in 2007 by Bajpai, Ixigo is concentrated on empowering travellers to plan, publication and also manage their journeys by leveraging artificial intelligence, artificial intelligence and also data science-led advancements. It is currently the 2nd greatest OTA in India by operating profits in FY22 with MakeMytrip being the marketplace leader.