Consolidation in OTA space still 2-3 years away: Yatra's Manish Amin

At a time when almost every sector in the consumer internet space is looking at consolidation, the online travel agency (OTA) segment still hasn't seen too many mergers or acquisitions. And Yatra co-founder and CIO Manish Amin believes it will remain that way for some time. "The online travel space is still growing. The four or five big players will continue to be there for two to three years," says Yatra co-founder and CIO Manish Amin in a conversation with Techcircle.in.

The biggies of the OTA space – MakeMyTrip, Cleartrip, Ibibo, Yatra – have managed to retain their lead in a market that has reached a relatively mature phase, and though several startups have debuted in the travel vertical, they haven't really been able to make much of a dent.

Yatra, meanwhile, is looking at the activities market while strengthening its core hotels and holidays business. It is also betting on automation to shorten the road to profitability.

"For the next financial year, our target is to automate as many processes as possible in the backend," he says, adding that Yatra is building robots and using artificial intelligence to ensure a better customer experience.