Goibibo Launches ‘Live Flight Tracking’ Service On App

Online travel platform Goibibo has introduced live flight tracking for 1,824 daily flight schedules. The service is available for both domestic and international flights.

Ashish Kashyap, founder & CEO, Ibibo Group said: “Flight tracking and status information is the first of its kind. This is in line with our focus of constantly delivering unique consumer experiences and at the same enhancing our travel social network, goContacts. We have an exciting line-up of innovative product releases for all our categories comprising air, hotels, bus and cars.”

The feature enables passengers:

• To get real-time data on the flight schedule, aircraft type, gate number, baggage carousel information.
• To get notified on delays with estimated time of departure and arrival; change in terminal and gate information.
• Enable friends/families to track their journey as well as get notified of arrival information or change in schedules.

According to a company statement, tracking by friends and families is a first of its kind feature launched by Goibibo wherein the passenger can define which of his contacts can receive live updates of their journey.

As of now, this feature is notification-based. Goibibo will shortly integrate the same with its goContacts social feature. Goibibo launched a travel social network – GoContacts – on its mobile app in June 2016. It allows travellers to get connected on the app, using their phone book.

As per a company statement, its flights business turned profitable in 2015. The domestic air ticketing business of Goibibo has grown by more than 115% which is 6x the growth of the market in the last one year and also outgrowing all other OTAs.  Mobile is becoming the primary channel for Goibibo. Mobile contributes to 65% of the flight bookings and 82% of hotel bookings on Goibibo.

In July 2016, Ibibo Group acquired a majority stake in Peru-based bus ticketing platform, Busportal (Empresa Digital Peruana S.A.C.) for an undisclosed amount. Ibibo, founded by Ashish Kashyap, and Naspers group, is an online travel group with integrated travel properties such as goibibo.com; YourBus (Vehicle tracking application) and recently launched car-sharing app, ibiboRyde.