Ixigo bets big on tie-up with PhonePe, eyes market share gain in flights, bus tickets

Bajpai said payments apps are focusing on super-app strategy by offering high value to customers and it makes sense for them to offer travel as a category.

"Optimistic about how fast PhonePe is growing and also our ability to discover new bookers in that funnel where we want to expand. In the early days of this partnership we are seeing decent potential," Bajpai said.

Also read: Ixigo profit more than doubled in FY24 at Rs 73 crore, income up 28%

Ixigo management added that with certain smaller carriers, it will give them more leverage to negotiate a better deal given more volumes.

International travel sees bigger growth

Bajpai said the company managed to grow the flight passenger segment by 77 percent in FY24, with AU-Ixigo co-branded credit card playing a role in it. It has emerged as a card of choice for many frequent travellers, including international ones.

One-third of the company’s international flight bookings in FY24 came from tier II, III, IV airports. International air traffic recorded faster growth than domestic, with a 22.5 percent growth in the overall market.

Ixigo's international flight passenger segment grew 100 percent year-on-year, fuelled by inventory and supply side expansion.

"India’s domestic air traffic at 15.34 crore passengers in FY24, saw a 13.5 percent YoY growth. There are over 1,100 planes on order by airlines in India. India is poised to become the fastest growing air market. However, short-term capacity issues, grounding of planes due to engine troubles, high load factors and high airfares are constraining the growth of the air market," Bajpai said.

The other segment where Ixigo sees an upside is trains due to lowering of restrictions in terms of bookings.

On June 28, IRCTC said the restriction on online travel aggregators and agents not to sell advance reservation period train tickets, booked 120 days early, and tatkal ones, which are the next day bookings, for the first 15 minutes, was being lowered to 10 minutes from June 29.

“So, OTAs now have five extra minutes for bookings in the peak demand time in the morning. We expect bookings upside from this move. This move is reflective of government bringing more parity in the space," Bajpai said.

The management also said the overall market growth might slow down this year due to capacity constraints. There is not much supply addition by traditional operators and they would welcome the entry of new-age operators such as Freshbus, Flixbus and Nuego in the space.

"Capacity addition on trains has generally been in the low to mid-single digits in our country but may pick up more momentum in coming years, once the freight corridors free up capacity and as Amrit Bharat, Vande Sleeper and Namo Bharat trains get manufactured and added to the route network," the management said.

The company, which announced its Q4 and FY24 results on July 4, reported a profit of Rs 73 crore in FY24 against Rs 23 crore in the previous year.

Its total income came in at Rs 665 crore, up 28.6 percent from Rs 517 crore.

Gross Transaction Value (GTV) crossed Rs 10,000 crore in FY24, growing 38 percent year-on-year (YoY) for the full year, and by 34.9 percent in the March quarter. It was led by flight GTV expansion of 75 percent for the full year and 63.6 percent for Q4.