Travel search app ixigo has launched one tap cab booking, which can call for a cab even in places without an Internet connection or GPS, such as airports (I’m looking at you Bangalore airport), railway stations and bus stations.
The feature is available on ixigo cabs, a meta aggregator of of cabs, autos and ground transportation services. Users can book cabs from providers such as Uber, Ola, TaxiForSure, EasyCabs, and Jugnoo. ixigo uses a combination of intelligence about the user’s location through existing PNR confirmations on a user’s phone and SMSes for when the internet connection doesn’t work to seamlessly book a cab for the user.
Users need to enable one-tap bookings on the ixigo app and a pop up bubble is placed on the screen, (similar to Facebook’s Messenger). Hold for three seconds to make a booking. The driver details will be shown soon. The app is currently available on Android and not on iOS.
ixigo has been padding up its service with multiple offerings:
– Last month, ixigo launched ixibook, a service which will allow users to book flights and hotels within the ixigo app, in a partnership with online travel agency Cleartrip and OYO Rooms respectively.
– In November last year, it launched a meta search called Super Value Hotels for curated budget hotels on its platform, with a collection of 2,500 budget hotels across 80 cities. It would aggregate and compare deals across hotel aggregators and online travel agencies where users would be able to compare hotel prices, ratings, reviews and amenities.
– In August, it acquired all the intellectual property of Desi Backpacking Travelers, the company that ran IndianBackpacker, for an undisclosed amount. The company added a ‘booking’ section to the IndianBackpacker website.
– In the same month, ixigo acquired Rutogo, an intercity cab aggregator for an undisclosed amount to help in scaling ixigo’s cabs app by building a marketplace for intercity taxi owners and vendors.
