Bdtickets, the Robi owned online ticketing company, has added air ticketing to its platform that will allow users to buy domestic airlines tickets on its platform, the company announced on Thursday (April 25). Bdtickets has been offering online ticketing for bus, launch, events, and movies. With the recent addition of domestic air ticketing, the company seeks to expand its coverage.
Founded in 2015, Bdtickets started out as a web-based platform offering online bus ticketing. It then gradually moved on to offer launch, events, and movies tickets. Bdtickets claims it has north of 66,000 tickets on its platform per day and covers 60 districts in Bangladesh. The company says it has been working on a consumer app and plans to launch it soon.
While online bus ticketing offers a meaningful business opportunity, launch, movie and event ticketing yet to offer that big an opportunity in Dhaka. Compared to that, travel booking offers a genuine growth opportunity as a growing number of people in the country opt-in for air travel. While Bdtickets start with domestic air ticketing, it can safely be predicted that the company will eventually expand to international air ticketing and then eventually hotel booking.
When Bdtickets started in 2015, Shohoz was the leading player in the online ticketing space. Shohoz has since moved on to add other transportation option and has eventually become a serious ride-hailing player in Dhaka. The move was essential for Shohoz to find new growth opportunities and fend off growing competition. For Bdtcikets, moving into broad booking space is a sound strategic move that should pay off in the long run.
