Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation is on a tie-up spree with the best-in-class technology start-ups. It had recently set MobiKwik as its primary mobile wallet on IRCTC Connect Android App, followed by partnering up with Chaayos for enabling the passengers to order freshly made tea and snacks right from the comfort of their seats.
Now, IRCTC has signed a deal with the innovative hotel room booking startup OYO Rooms to enable its passengers to book their accommodation across 45,000 hotel rooms across 170 cities in the country.
This tie-up would enable the train passengers to find an affordable accommodation at their place of travel well in advance. This partnership spree by IRCTC symbolises the government’s recognition of the home-grown tech startups for driving the next wave of innovation.
IRCTS wants to enhance its services through innovation and partnering up with ‘Made in India’ initiatives.
“We are committed to drive efficiencies and enhance our service through innovation. OYO Rooms has propelled the hotel market in India towards new horizon and pioneered the standardization of affordable hotel-rooms. This partnership contributes another chapter to the successful narrative of “Made in India” initiatives and how tech-enabled solutions will power the next wave of innovation. We have made the necessary technology integrations and will be actively communicating about this newly available option through e-mailers, information on e-tickets so that our travellers can explore and utilize these services,” said Dr. A.K. Manocha, IRCTC CMD.
OYO Rooms was conceived with a vision to change the way travellers consider out-of-home stay and this tie-up with IRCTC marks a milestone in that journey.
“We are honoured and delighted to power the hotels-booking engine of IRCTC and serve Indian railway passengers. With this tie-up IRCTC customers will have ready access to OYO’s inventory of predictable, standardized and affordable hotel accommodation, across 170 cities in India. As India’s widest and largest network, we feel confident of catering to the passengers’ needs and look forward to making this alliance a great success,” said Abhinav Sinha, COO at OYO Rooms.
“OYO Rooms was conceived with a vision to change the way travellers view out-of-home stay. Our aim is to deliver home-like comfort at affordable prices so that wherever you may be travelling to, you would want to stay at an OYO booked through IRCTC-OYO network. The first step towards fulfilling this mandate was to expand our footprint to provide the comfort of a wide network. We are now focusing on enhancing guest experience and making our processes more robust through technology,” Abhinav added.
IRCTC is the biggest e-commerce player in India witnessing 5-5.5 lakhs bookings per day. OYO Rooms, on the other hand, recently crossed 1 million check-ins across its country network of hotel rooms.
OYO Rooms has revolutionized the Indian hospitality sector by offering convenient room booking experience across all types of hotels. Some of the facilities provided by OYO Rooms are AC rooms, complimentary breakfast, Wi-Fi, and 24×7 customer support.
The hotel room booking service via OYO Rooms is already live on irctc.co.in. It would be interesting to note which tech startup would be the next partner of IRCTC for improving its overall ecosystem.
