Le Travenues Technology, the firm that operates Artificial intelligence-based travel app, ixigo, has bought the business and operations of the Hyderabad-based bus ticketing and aggregation platform, AbhiBus, as a going concern on a slump sale basis.
The business transfer agreement includes a mix of cash and Ixigo stock as consideration, while all AbhiBus intellectual property, brands, technology and operations are being transferred to ixigo.
Following the acquisition, the AbhiBus team, led by founder Sudhakar Reddy Chirra has joined the ixigo team. “We are excited to be joining ixigo,...and remain committed as a team towards our joint vision of serving the underserved market segment of the next billion travellers in the country, for whom trains and buses are the primary modes of transportation,” said Mr. Chirra.
A joint release from the entities citing industry reports said that AbhiBus was the second largest bus aggregator in India in FY-20, selling 26,000 bus tickets per day through its platform. The acquisition will help the ixigo group to consolidate its presence in Tier 2/3/4 markets by offering a multi-modal transportation experience across trains, flights and buses, to its combined user base of nearly 255 million users (as on May 31).
Co-founders of ixigo Aloke Bajpai and Rajnish Kumar said, “AbhiBus has built an innovative and high growth company with penetration on the supply side across state road transport companies (SRTCs) and private bus operators in several states.”
This is ixigo’s second acquisition of the year. In February, it had acquired the train booking app Confirmtkt.
