MakeMyTrip Revenue Grows 169% QoQ In Q3 FY21

Publicly listed Indian online travel company MakeMyTrip saw its gross bookings increase by 181.5%, from $213 Mn in the second quarter of the fiscal year 2020-21 (FY21) to $599 Mn in the third quarter, ended December 31, 2020. 

In Q3, the company generated a revenue of $56.8 Mn, a 169% quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) growth, but a fall of 61.3% year-on-year (YoY) over revenue of $146.9 Mn in the quarter ended December 31, 2019. 

In its unaudited financial statements for the previous quarter (Q3 FY21), the company mentions that as compared to Q3 FY20, the business continues to be severely affected due to the Covid-19 pandemic, even as countrywide lockdown measures have continued to be gradually lifted since May 2020. 

The company’s revenue from air ticketing, hotels and packages and bus ticketing, all improved substantially in Q3, when compared to the previous quarter, but remained substantially lower than the same time period in FY20. Notably, while MakeMyTrip had turned a loss of $21.2 Mn in Q2 FY21, it registered a loss of $3.5 Mn in Q3, representing an improvement of $17.7 Mn QoQ due to gradual recovery in travel demand.

As for the breakup of the company’s total revenue, $18.2 Mn was air ticketing revenue, $24.4 Mn was hotels and packages revenue, $10.1 Mn was bus ticketing revenue, and $4.1 Mn was revenue from other sources. 

“MakeMyTrip continues to stay focused on business revival led by a gradual recovery in India’s domestic travel demand, although the revival of international travel demand is likely to take much longer,” said Deep Kalra, group executive chairman at MakeMyTrip.

“In addition, our cost optimization initiatives have helped us to deliver on our strategic goal of achieving adjusted operating profitability during the reported quarter.” 

While the pandemic impacted businesses across sectors, the impact was particularly severe on the travel industry. In India, there was a hard lockdown from late-March to late-May, resulting in travel demand virtually dying, before reviving ever so slowly. 

Besides, the Indian government had barred all domestic and international flights between March 24 to May 22, 2020, which hit aviation companies and online ticketing companies.

Restrictions on interstate travel continued to be placed well until December last year. Online travel companies were forced to scale down their activities and lay off huge chunks of their workforce. 

In June, MakeMyTrip had laid off nearly 350 employees, anticipating a poor financial performance. 

In terms of yearly performance, the company had recorded revenue of $511.52 Mn in FY20, a YoY of 5.3% from $486.11 Mn in FY19. The company’s loss for the year has grown nearly 3x from $167.83 Mn in FY19 to $447.57 Mn in FY20. The company’s gross bookings have grown 11.9% YoY from $5.44 Bn to $6.09 Bn.

Judging by how its quarterly earnings are still substantially lower on a YoY basis, it is expected that MakeMyTrip’s FY21 earnings will not be able to touch the FY20 levels.