With $70 million valuation, Eatigo enters online restaurant reservation segment in India

Bangkok-headquartered Eatigo, a discount-based online restaurant reservation platform, is now in India (Pune and Mumbai) and making swift moves to register its presence in the country’s ecosystem.

After acquiring a Pune-based online reservation player Ressy, the new entrant further wants to stir the market – and that with valuation number.

Eatigo, which is worth a $70 million, is now seeking a valuation of $100 million.

“This is the first time that we have made an acquisition in any market and with Ressy, we expect to jump-start our India launch. With the launch of the Philippines and India operations, we expect our valuation to cross $100 million since we are now going to be present in six markets in South East Asia,’’ said Siddhanta Kothari, Chief Financial Officer, Eatigo International.

Last year, the platform had raised $15.5 million in its Series B round from PlanB, a Thailand-based media house; and travel discovery platform, TripAdvisor.

Eatigo also has presence across six markets including Hongkong, Malaysia and Singapore. In India, the startup plans to grow inorganically and would be looking forward to strategic partnerships and acquisitions spread its presence across India.

“Today, we are present in Pune and Mumbai but to have pan-India presence we would look at small hyper local players who can be a strategic fit to our operations. We have already raised two rounds of funding and can afford to explore more opportunities in India,’’ added Kothari.

Online table reservation in India is yet to be popular as users still prefer for booking at arrival time. Currently, Dineout, Easy diner and Zomato are the three major players, however, none of them has reached a sizeable scale.

Kothari added that he would be covering five-star hotels like Hyatt to quick service restaurants. Indians may not have a habit of making online reservations but he intend to motivate them with discounts ranging from 10 per cent to 50 per cent as there is always affinity towards such discounts.

Presently, the company offers its service to 300 restaurants, listed on its app, but it intends to take it up the number to 1,000 in markets such as Mumbai and Pune.

It appears the platform is in no hurry to make money and is ready to burn some cash as a market capturing strategy. “We take 12-18 months to break even in any market and have already done so in Thailand and Singapore,’’ added Kothari.

Image credit: Tech in Asia