Chennai: October 6, 2015: Online bus ticketing aggregator, Ticketgoose today signed an MOU with the Chennai Mathematical Institute to leverage data sciences to bring in scalable productivity enhancement to the bus industry.
“Bus travel has to become the main and biggest form of travel particularly for distances within a radius of 500 km” said Mr Naru Narayanan, Chairman of Ticketgoose. With train travel absolutely bursting at the seams and little increase in capacity, movement between cities continues to depend on bus.
And here is what the industry is likely to look like according to Arun Athiappan, CEO, Ticketgoose.
• The supply side consisting of bus operators is a fragmented market. Some level of consolidation will take place in this industry with strong brands emerging at the State level.
• State undertakings that dominate the bus industry will gradually release their near monopolistic hold over the industry, as private operators begin to offer customer conveniences that are simply not available today.
• Clean toilets in every bus, making bus travel more convenient for women.
• Facilities for handicapped persons to conveniently board and alight.
• Improved services between major cities and at convenient timings.
• Luxury class travel to be also available on buses.
• GPS enabled buses with a time table and passenger awareness of current status from anywhere in the country.
• Dynamic pricing of bus tickets based on demand/supply as being practiced in the airline industry.
Rajeeva Karandikar, Director, Chennai Mathematical Institute added, “Mathematics and statistics have significant capability to transform industries. CMI works with forward looking companies like Ticketgoose to bring together IT and Mathematical sciences to effectively disrupt industries. Towards this and to make our services available to industry, we have created an entity called Algo Labs and our faculty now have the means to offer their consulting services thru Algo Labs.
Mr Lakshmi Narayanan, who is on the Board of Governors of CMI and also the Vice President of Cognizant Technologies, said “Bringing together Maths, Stats and business algorithms can elevate the industry to become cutting edge. With this big step in the bus industry, I am able to visualize that 10 years from now, we would be at the forefront of offering technology across the globe, and well integrated into innovations such as driverless buses. I consider this a historical step for the bus industry and take this opportunity to wish Algo Labs and Ticket Goose the very best. It is efforts like this that will finally launch India into the next decade”.
The MOU was signed under the auspices of Lakshmi Narayanan, Vice Chairman, Cognizant & Governor of Board, CMI and Naru Narayanan, Chairman of the Board, Ticketgoose.
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Ticketgoose.com, a pioneer in online ticketing has been revolutionizing the bus ticket booking experience in India ever since the launch in August 2007. With time based filters and available seat position being displayed at the result page itself, TicketGoose enables quick booking based on users’ past choices. TicketGoose mobile app provides bus tracking facility using real time locations, enables to share the ticket with family and friends besides providing information on highway motel ranking that is crowd sourced. With more than 1800 operators displaying their inventory on the platform, and over 40 operators using the TicketGoose platform to integrate their fleet operation, TicketGoose has been the torchbearer for organising the hitherto unorganised bus industry in the country. The team at TicketGoose headed by Arun Athiappan, Co-Founder and CEO, under the able guidance of R Narayanan, Chairman, comprises of highly qualified and dedicated technical professionals who are focussed on ensuring hassle-free, cost effective and happy travel for consumers.