REDBUS

About redBus

Type
Industry
Founded
Founders

: Privately held company

: Electronic commerce
: Bangalore, India (August 2006)
: Phanindra Reddy Sama, Sudhakar
Pasupunuri, Charan Padmaraju
Headquarters : Bangalore, India
Area served : India
Key people
: Prakash Sangam(CEO)
Revenue
: 600 million (March 2013)
Employees
:750 (Jan 2014)
Website
: Redbus.in

COMPETITION
Red bus had three main types of competition.
Big players: big players like Indian railways (IRCTC
online) and OTAs (makemytrip, Cleartrip, goibibo,
Yatra and Expedia).
These companies held more than 80% of the
market share of the online travel market.
Individual travel agents: who was using a manual
ticket booking.
Most of the bookings in smaller towns and cities
were done with the help of these travel agents.

 redbus competed with them using a three step

approach.
1. Online booking.
2. Telephone booking.
3. Commission based partnership with travel
agents.
Direct competition :online bus ticket booking
companies like travelyaari, ticketgoose, abhibus,
simplybus, nomorequeue, busticketvala and
mybusvala.

 During 2011 online bus ticket booking redBus

had market share more than 65%.
Redbus estimates ,
1. 50% via internet
2. 30% via call centre
3. 20% via OTAs using the seat seller network

Customer segmentation
Redbus defined its customer segmentation
across five category.
1. Private bus operator(BOSS software).
2. Bus travellers(website and call centre).
3. OTAs like Expedia &yatra(air travel, hotels
cabs and package tours).
4. State Govt RTCs(most of these unprofitable).
5. Bus manufacturers.

Customer value proposition

The value of proposition included a value of
three different comprising.
1. The BOSS application for bus operators.
2. The web site (www.redBus.in), offline call
centre, franchisee contact points for bus
travelers(B2C).
3. The seat seller application for online travel
agents(B2B).

 redBus defined its business as enabling access to reliable

transparent ticket selling and buying system for operators and
travelers.
Private bus opertor and RTCs, the value provided by redBus
included
1. Increase in revenue by reflecting the real time inventory of
available seats to traveler .
2. Timely payments for ticket sales.
3. Standardised commission rates.
4. Sharing research and analytics based information on new
profitable routes.
5. Providing equal visibility to all operators, small or big .
6. Eliminating the dependency of the bus operators on travel
agents for seat bookings and payments. and
7. Online ratings of the bus operators on the basis of quality
of services.

 The company focused on building trust and

transparency by undertaking by under taking on
going actions aimed at improving efficiency,
accessibility and availability for bus travelers
across India.
The value provided redBus included
1. Transparency in the booking system.
2. Reliability of service.
3. Real time access to available tickets on
requested routes.
4. transparent pricing. and
5. Choice on the bus, seat number, payment mode,
ticket delivery , pick up point and etc...

Technology and innovation

redBus started with three product offrings
1. BOSS
2. redBus online platform. and
3. Seat seller.

Financial performance
The company developed multiple revenue
streams.
1. Revenues generated from the sale of the
BOSS application to the bus operators.
2. Revenues generated from the sale of the seat
seller plug-in to OTAs .and
3. Revenues generated from the commission
charged to bus operators for the sale of ticket
through the redBus ecosytem.

 Company revenue increase steadily from INR

0.4 million in 2007,INR 345 million in 2012
and 600 million in march 2013.