Treebo lost almost Rs 3 for every rupee in revenue for FY18

Hotel aggregator Treebo, run by Ruptub Solutions Pvt. Ltd, made a net loss for the year through March that was nearly thrice its revenue.
The company's net sales for 2017-18 more than doubled to Rs 41.4 crore from Rs 17.9 crore the previous year, according to its filings with the Registrar of Companies (RoC). 

But its net loss widened to Rs 114.9 crore from Rs 73.5 crore. That means it lost about Rs 3 for every rupee it made in revenue.

Bengaluru-based Treebo’s total expenditure grew to Rs 162 crore from Rs 91 crore.

The company’s co-founder Sidharth Gupta declined to comment on the financials.

Treebo was founded in 2015 by former McKinsey and Myntra executives Rahul Chaudhary and Gupta and former MakeMyTrip executive Kadam Jeet Jain.

Before launching this venture, Gupta and Chaudhary worked as vice-presidents at Flipkart-owned fashion e-tailer Myntra. They were colleagues at McKinsey & Co. before that. Jain, their co-founder and fellow alumnus from IIT Roorkee, was the vice president of engineering at MyGola, an online travel company that was acquired by MakeMyTrip earlier this year.

In August last year, Treebo had raised $34 million (Rs 220 crore then) in its Series C funding round led by Hong Kong-based investment firms Ward Ferry Management and Karst Peak Capital.

Treebo works with new and existing hotels on a franchise model. It offers its brand name, quality oversight, access to vendors, staff training, and sales and marketing expertise to the property.

The hotel chain operator had raised Rs 112 crore ($16.7 million then) in 2016 in its Series B funding round that was led by Bertelsmann India Investments, the strategic investment vehicle of international media company Bertelsmann. Existing investors SAIF Partners and Matrix Partners India had also taken part in the round.

In 2015, it had raised $6 million in its Series A round of funding co-led by Matrix and SAIF.

Treebo competes with FabHotels and OYO Rooms, besides online travel companies such as MakeMyTrip and Yatra, which have also entered the hotel aggregation segment.

Last month, OYO raised $1 billion (around Rs 7,300 crore) in a funding round from existing investors led by Japanese conglomerate SoftBank. This catapulted the company to a valuation of $5 billion from $850 million last year.