Published: 08 Nov 2007

Through the alliance, Yatra plans to increase the penetration of travel related services, including air tickets and hotels/packages at retail level, via 7000 Sify's Retail Points across 220 cities in India.

Sify Retail centers will act as extended retail points to offer Yatra.com's travel services with an integrated offline cash acceptance model of Sify Technology Ltd.

Customers who are more comfortable with an offline payment mode and do not have access to credit cards or are wary of using their credit cards for e-commerce transactions, will be able to avail the services yatra.com currently offers online. Through the tie up, Yatra.com hopes to enlarge its customer base by tapping these customers, which accounts for roughly one third of all air travelers in India.

"Sify's expertise and its pan India reach will help Yatra extend its services to mass consumers in smaller cities and non metros, who are still not familiar or comfortable with Internet and credit card transactions and can now on book tickets and pay by cash over the counter," said Dhruv Shringi, CEO and Co-Founder, Yatra.

Akashdeep Singh, Vice President, Sify Technologies Ltd, said, "Sify I-Way and broadband partners will help Yatra.com to instantly extend reach to more customers. With our network expansion plans this year we hope to be the largest Value Added partner with Yatra.com. Customers can avail a complete range of services through our centers. The tie-up will offer greater accessibility of Yatra.com services to a larger section of the market and help satiate the growing appetite of travel by the Indian consumers."