Dipti Gore
Akshay Chhugani joins ixigo as Head, Traveller Communities
New Delhi, August 14, 2015: ixigo, India’s leading mobile travel search marketplace has announced that it has completed the acquisition of all intellectual property of Desi Backpacking Travelers Pvt. Ltd., the company that runs IndianBackpacker.com – India’s leading community for budget travellers, for an undisclosed amount. As a part of the deal, Akshay Chhugani, Founder & CEO of The Indian Backpacker will also be joining ixigo as “Head, Traveller Communities”.
Aloke Bajpai, Co-Founder & CEO, ixigo said – “As a part of ixigo’s vision of simplifying the lives of Indian travelers, we want to build a strong connect with communities of travelers who possess a shared passion, purpose or taste. Akshay has traveled extensively through India on a shoestring budget and has mastered the art of spending less and traveling more in terms of budget accommodation, destinations and experiences. At ixigo, he will be responsible to build and nurture curated communities of travelers across interest areas. We look forward to building an authentic Indian traveler community and curate deep knowledge of offbeat destinations and niche travel experiences.”
Commenting on the deal, Akshay said – “ixigo has emerged as the most innovative aggregator in the Indian travel space, with the smartest apps for budget travelers and an organically grown & loyal user-base. There is a clear opportunity to build a community platform that enhances engagement and provides authentic and unbiased curated content for Indian travelers. I am pretty excited about the possibilities our shared vision unfolds.”
A travel enthusiast since he was 16, Akshay has stayed at Ashrams, trekked to the hills, tried out local street food at small towns and made new friends from across the globe. In a short time, he made IndianBackpacker.com a credible source of information and bookings for backpackers coming to India. His passion was to popularize India as a backpacking destination and to create awareness about the beauty, culture and heritage of this country. He has earlier worked with WNS as a travel expert for Travelocity.com. Akshay’s previous projects also include working with companies like Exposure Media Marketing (which publishes Selling World Travel magazine), Eventus India and Aegis Global Vantedge. Apart from that he has Volunteered actively with Yuvraj Singh Foundation, YouWeCan and was heading all their Alliances and Communications.
ixigo recently received investment from Micromax, India’s leading smartphone manufacturer, and is looking to grow five-fold to reach over 30 million monthly active mobile users by the end of 2016.
Launched in 2007 in Gurgaon, India by Aloke Bajpai and Rajnish Kumar, ixigo is India’s leading travel search marketplace, connecting over 60 million travellers with content & deals from over 25,000 online & offline travel & hospitality businesses. ixigo aggregates and compares real-time travel information, prices & availability for flights, trains, buses, cabs, hotels, packages & destinations. ixigo’s mission is to simplify the lives of travellers by building apps that make their travel search and planning hassle-free and it has won several awards in its journey, including the TiE-Lumis Entrepreneurial Excellence Award and the NASSCOM Top-10 Emerge Award.