Yatra Q3 Revenue Up By 17% As India Domestic Travel Regains Momentum

Gurugram-headquartered online travel operator Yatra recorded a revenue of $4.2 Mn in the third quarter of the current fiscal year 2020-21 (FY21), ended December 31, 2020, a 17% quarter-on-quarter on improvement from Q2 FY21, when the company had recorded a revenue of $3.6 Mn. 

The company’s adjusted revenue for the quarter stood at $8.3 Mn, a growth of 60.6% QoQ but a fall of nearly 62% year-on-year (YoY). This a trend noted with most companies operating in the travel segment. While revenues are certainly improving as the financial year progresses, they still remain below par, when compared to the company’s financial performance with the corresponding period in FY20. 

In Q3, publicly listed online travel portal MakeMyTrip generated a revenue of $56.8 Mn, a 169% QoQ growth, but a fall of 61.3% YoY over revenue of $146.9 Mn in the quarter ended December 31, 2019.

As for the breakup of Yatra’s revenue, adjusted revenue from air ticketing was $5.9 Mn, representing an increase of 69.2% QoQ versus a decrease of YOY 58.1%, while adjusted revenue from hotels and packages was $1.5 Mn representing an increase of 140.8% QoQ versus a decrease of 48.8% YoY. 

The company’s total gross bookings stood at 78.9 Mn, an increase of 243% QoQ but a 72.7% reduction YoY. In contrast, MakeMyTrip’s gross bookings for the same quarter stood at $599 Mn, a QoQ increase of 181.5%. 

For the period, Yatra’s loss stood at $3 Mn, versus a loss of $4.1 Mn in Q2 2020, an improvement of 27% QoQ but a 292% increase in loss YoY. 

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.

“We have seen airline capacity and loads improving, with domestic December traffic averaging approximately 230,000 passengers a day, up from 125,000 a day in September. December 2020 passenger traffic now stands at 56.3% of December 2019 levels based on data from ‘Directorate General of Civil Aviation India’,” said Dhruv Shringi, cofounder and CEO at Yatra.

“We continue to make strong progress towards our stated goal of achieving Adjusted EBITDA break-even in the first half of 2021 and believe our current liquidity position and cost optimisation efforts provide us with enough capital to withstand a prolonged slowdown in the travel industry should that occur,” he added. 

Founded in August 2006 by Sabina Chopra, Manish Amin and Dhruv Shringi, Yatra provides a full range of travel-related services such as domestic and international air ticketing, hotel booking, homestays, holiday packages, bus ticketing, rail ticketing, activities, attractions and ancillary services.

The company claims to have tie-ups with 70K hotels in India and nearly 800K hotels across the world. It is backed by IDG Ventures, Vertex Venture Management, Norwest Venture Partners and other investors.

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. 

Addressing an investor call in June last year, Yatra CEO Dhruv Shringi said that the company had adequate liquidity to weather conditions for a sustained period of time. Shringi said that domestic travel would come by gradually and by the same time next year, he expects the firm to hit pre-Covid run rates.