OYO Rooms, a network of branded hotels which claims to be one of its kind in India in the budget hotel space, on Tuesday said it will offer 2,000 rooms in 150 hotels across Bengaluru in a year’s time, from the current 300 rooms in 29 hotels.
OYO’s hotels in Bengaluru cover the city’s major locations like Brigade Road, Koramangala, Whitefield, Indiranagar and MG Road. OYO, currently present in 14 cities, has 200 hotels with 2,500 rooms in its network. The company’s CEO Ritesh Agarwal told Deccan Herald that it is targeting to be present in 45 cities with an inventory of 10,000 rooms in a year’s time.
OYO doesn’t own or even manage the hotels. Instead, it enters into an agreement with the hotel owner, based on which it rebrands, standardises services, trains the staff, invests in hotel equipment, and drives customers to the properties through its website and mobile site, in return for an average 25 per cent revenue share. Agarwal claims to drive 90 per cent of the business of hotels in the network through OYO’s online platforms, tie-ups with travel portals, and other sales initiatives, even as its operations managers in the city constantly monitor customer experience.
Room rents start at Rs 999 a night for leisure and business travelers in OYO properties. They are equipped with comfortable beds, air conditioning, TV, free and unlimited Wi-Fi, clean and attached washroom, and a complimentary breakfast service. The company recently raised Rs 150 crore (US $25 million) in venture capital funding from Lightspeed Ventures, Sequoia Capital, and Green Oaks Capital.
OYO doesn’t have a smartphone app as yet. Agarwal said the company is working on one, and said it is probable that OYO may shut down the mobile site once the app is in place. At present, the split is even between the mobile and desktop website for that part of the revenues which OYO generates from its own platforms, he said.