This startup lets travelers share their tales, itineraries, and more. And it just got funded

Those bitten by the travel bug always have a lot of tales to tell. Stories of serendipity, of the best-laid plans going awry, of the exquisite pleasure of discovering a whole new cuisine, and so on. Delhi-based startup Tripoto lets them share their travel experiences, post itineraries and stories along with pictures, maps, and reviews. This one-year-old startup just raised US$400,000 in a seed round of funding to become more tech-savvy at doing this.

Founded by Indian School of Business (ISB) alumni Michael Lyngdoh and Anirudh Gupta, Tripoto helps travelers discover new places to visit by facilitating community sharing. Tech in Asia wrote about Tripoto a month after it launched in September 2013, when it had published around 50 itineraries. Now it claims to have one of the largest global communities of travelers with around 300,000 monthly unique visitors and over 650,000 unique page views.

Tripoto’s funding round announced today was led by Outbox Ventures. Founders of Snapdeal Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal, founder of MakeMyTrip and TrulyMadly Sachin Bhatia, and co-founder of LetsVenture Shanti Mohan are some of the angel investors who participated.

Tripoto co-founder Anirudh Gupta, an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi, said that the funds will be used to “build a quality-driven content team and consolidate technology for a seamless customer experience.” Tripoto’s travel app for Android users is available on Google Play, and its iOS version will be released in a week’s time, he added in a statement.

In India, travel is one of the hottest sectors today. From booking to discovery and travelogues, biggies like MakeMyTrip, Expedia, and ClearTrip jostle with newbies like TripHobo, FindMyCarrots, and Tripoto.

MakeMyTrip recently set up a US$15 million innovation fund to support early-stage startups. According to its official statement, the fund will be deployed to back startups in travel technology, with a special focus on mobile and IP-based companies.

One of Tripoto’s main competitors is Bangalore-based HolidayIQ, backed by Tiger Global and Accel Partners, a pioneer in this space. Founded by Hari Nair, who was a Partner with KPMG India before turning entrepreneur, HolidayIQ claims traffic of five million visitors per month.

Chetan Kapoor, research analyst with PhocusWright, shared a few insights into the Indian online travel industry with Tech in Asia:

• Nearly two in five travel transactions are done online in India.

• India will become the most penetrated online travel market in APAC in the next two or three years.

• The Indian online travel market will buck the global trend of slowing online growth, and instead continue growing in double-digits through 2016 with increasing penetration. “Reasons for this is the continued expansion of the domestic air market, including new carriers starting operations. Even the hotel segment, which is fairly untapped online, will contribute significantly in boosting the Indian online travel market in the years to come,” Kapoor said.

• Online travel agencies (OTAs) accounted for slightly over a third of the Indian online market.

• Expansion in the accommodation segment and leveraging on mobile point of sales will enable OTAs to gain share of the online market through 2016.