MakeMyTrip revenue for March quarter climbs 23%, loss shrinks

MakeMyTrip Ltd, the country's largest online travel services provider, reported higher revenue and narrower loss for the fourth quarter of the financial year 2018-19, on the back of significant growth in its main business verticals.

Adjusted revenue for the quarter ended March showed a 23% rise in constant currency terms to $163 million from $145 million a year earlier, the Nasdaq-listed company said in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

Since April 2018, MakeMyTrip has been counting the following as a reduction in revenue: Upfront customer acquisition costs, cash incentives and the cost of select loyalty programmes. Earlier, the company used to count these under the head of marketing and promotional costs.

With the new method of reporting numbers, the overall marketing and sales promotional expenses have almost halved to $41.7 million from $93.9 million during the year.

Adjusted operating loss shrank to $18.4 million from $23.5 million during the period. Adjusted operating loss excludes employee share-based compensation costs and amortisation of acquisition-related intangibles.

Adjusted net loss, which takes into account share-based compensation costs of employees, income tax and other things, narrowed to $18 million from $26 million during the period.

For the fourth quarter, adjusted revenue from air ticketing increased 17% in constant currency to $62.5 million from $58.5 million a year earlier. Revenue from the hotels and packages business, the biggest contributor to its total revenue in recent times, climbed 21% to $76.8 million from $69.4 million during the period.

Adjusted revenue from the bus ticketing segment showed a 40.8% rise in constant currency to $15.6 million from $12 million during the period. Revenue from this vertical was earlier clubbed with small businesses.

“The execution of our strategies has allowed us to improve our market share and drive strong growth rates across gross bookings, adjusted revenue and standalone hotels online room nights. We also improved marketing and promotional spend efficiencies to reduce our operating losses meaningfully for the full financial year,” said Deep Kalra, founder, group chairman and group chief executive officer at MakeMyTrip.

Net revenue for the full financial year jumped 26.2% in constant currency terms to $673.4 million from $577 million during the period. Adjusted net loss shrunk to $103.6 million from $153.5 million during the period.

Last month, TechCircle reported that Ctrip (now Trip.com) will become the largest stakeholder in MakeMyTrip, following a share-swap deal with South African conglomerate Naspers.

In the same month, MakeMyTrip acquired a majority stake in Mumbai-based corporate travel management firm Quest2Travel.