The Hindu Business Line : Thomas Cook keen to invest in online portals

WITH the growing interest in online bookings, travel services major Thomas Cook (India) Ltd, is eyeing online portals with a view to investing in them. According to Mr Ashwini Kakkar, CEO & MD, Thomas Cook (India) Ltd, "There has seen a spurt in this business and almost 4-5 per cent of our bookings come through our company site itself. There are plans to strike some large deals with such online portals in future."

In the past, Thomas Cook had acquired a small stake in one of the auction portals, Bid or Buy. But the subsequent merger of this portal with the leading auction portal Baazee.com, saw the company's share dwindle to a mere 1 per cent in the merged entity. Today, although Thomas Cook continues to be Baazee's partner in the online booking space, it feels there is potential in investing further into the business and spending money behind more portals.

Added Mr Kakkar, "We are looking once again at becoming exclusive partners in the online booking operations. There are plans to strike large deals in this business and we shall make our announcements soon. We will be definitely investing behind this part of the travel segment."

With almost three billion tourists thronging the country, Thomas Cook is also looking at investing into India-specific campaigns. While the `Incredible India' campaign created by O&M has been responsible to a certain extent, there are plans to invest in more of such mega campaigns.

Informs Mr Kakkar, "The Government has already set aside an ad budget of Rs 50 crore and it will be all about promoting brand India. We, along with more tour operators, are investing in this campaign. There are plans to air these campaigns across major television channels such as BBC and CNN."

He further added, "This season has been good for us. All our businesses have shown a strong performance and we have achieved results beyond our targets."

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