Indonesian Unicorn Traveloka Expands Beyond Southeast Asia To Australia

For a startup to grow, it needs to expand beyond its original market, to include those outside the borders.

Traveloka is an online travel-booking service, and one of Indonesia's unicorn startup. And here, the company chooses Australia, saying that its services have been made available and accessible to users in the continent.

What this means, users in Australia can benefit from Traveloka's services that include flight booking, hotel accommodation, airport transfers and tickets to attractions and activities.

Traveloka has been aggressively spreading its reach. Users in Southeast Asian countries, including Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam, have been able to use the company's services for some time, before the service finally go beyond Asia.

Yady Guitana, head of global partnerships at Traveloka, said that:

"Today we are thrilled to be able to add new countries outside Southeast Asia. In general, Australia is a country that has better infrastructure in terms of internet connectivity, payment options and adoption."

"We hope that our digital presence in Australia can further enrich the lives of our users by empowering them to discover the world around them by offering various travel and lifestyle products on one platform."

One of the reasons Traveloka chooses Australia, is because Indonesia was ranked the second after New Zealand as a destination of choice for Australian outbound tourists. According to Indonesia’s statistics bureau (BPS), 1.3 million Australian tourists visited Indonesia in 2018.

In 2019, Indonesia is expected to attract 20 million foreign visitors, including 1.5 million from Australia.

To make this happen, the company partners with the government's Wonderful Indonesia tourism promotion program, and said that it is committed to help Indonesia reach its target.

With its expansion to Australia, Traveloka is also expected to introduce more tourist attractions in Indonesia to Australian travelers, and vice versa.

'Traveloka

Edy Wardoyo, deputy of marketing development at the Indonesian Ministry of Tourism, said that:

"The government's target to attract 20 million foreign tourists will not be achieved if it does not synergize with players in the industry."

"Together with Traveloka, we hope this synergy can help our mission, and we will continue to support Traveloka to exist in this new market. The Australian market itself is one of the promising tourism markets, where foreign tourist visits from Australia to Indonesia continue to increase year on year. Traveloka's decision to open in the Australian market is very important to help in facilitating travel access and answer the diverse travel needs of users."

Australia which has a better internet infrastructure than Indonesia, and also a better online payment adoption, should help Traveloka further enrich lives of its users in Australia, by empowering them to discover the world around them, as explained by Guitana.

Co-founded by Ferry Unardi, the company has raised seed funding rounds from East Ventures, Rocket Internet’s Global Founders Capital and more.

Expedia, the American global travel technology company, also has a minority stake in Traveloka, helping the startup add international hotel accommodation beyond Asia to its platform.

Published: 
27/02/2019