‘We aim to digitise all healthcare-related forums to ensure their digital transformation in healthcare, rendering top-of-the-shelf consistent service which serves you and your family when it really matters. You can now keep your Electronic Medical Record (EMR) along with other useful assistance specially designed for the users’
— Rama Kini
Two computer science specialists, who met and married in the US, decided to return to India and set up a bunch of businesses—in diversely different areas, but with a common thread, the IT spine. Their businesses are built on solutions that resolve customer pain points
He gave up his US citizenship and came back to India to offer better travel solutions. She accompanied him back, and runs a 1,000-people company with offices in the US, India, Vietnam and Australia. “Growing up in a village in Andhra Pradesh, I had always felt that the system of booking tickets in buses needed a lot of improvement,” says Renil Komitla. “I had thought of entering the bus ticket booking business way back in 2008, even before redBus and the others that followed it came up. But I didn’t have the money to do anything then.”
So Renil moved to Bengaluru and studied for his B Sc, graduating in 1997. He was a good student, he got a full scholarship for his Masters in Computer Science from the University of North Carolina, North Carolina, USA. “I went to the US with $20—my parents could not afford to give me any more than that,” he recalls, explaining that his father was a veterinary doctor in the village, while his mother was a teacher in Nellore. Once he had enrolled in the University, he got a job with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department as a Software Consultant in the information technology division. “I worked with them for 13 months; designing, developing and deploying a database for crime labs,” he says.
After he graduated two years later, he did what most other Indian students in the US did: he got a job in the information technology industry, working for the next nine years in IT companies including Cisco Systems. In 2008, he went on to do, again, what many others like him do. The entrepreneurial bug bit him and he set up his own services company, Paxterra Software Solutions, which works with customers to help them with their engineering needs so that they can in turn focus on their core business. Meanwhile, he had met and married Rama Kini, who was also studying in the US for her Ph D after finishing a double Masters in Computer Science and Organic Chemistry from Osmania University and Hyderabad.
Back in the country of their birth, Renil— who had spent 15 years in the US—and Rama built up Paxterra into one of the fastest-growing players in the field. The company is now rechristened Terralogic; and, run by Rama as its CEO, has grown far beyond its earlier geographies of India and the US to become a true multinational, though most of its employees work from the Bengaluru headquarters. “Terralogic has a strong portfolio of customer engagements from telecommunications, manufacturing, semiconductors, transportation, insurance, retail, oil and gas, sports, travel and tourism, hospitality, banking and entertainment industries,” Rama explains.
Renil, however, was still chasing the childhood dream he had not been able to bring to reality in his youth. In 2013, he set up YatraGenie. com to do just that. “I had checked whatever gaps I could find in the travel business,” he says. “I identified local transportation, buses and economy hotels. But I couldn’t afford to get into all three fields. I had to decide which I could do first within my limited budget— it was a chicken-or-egg situation!” His choice was bus ticketing; and obviously, with his background in information technology, it was online. He also began in a smaller way with taxi bookings.
Why, after all his experience in infotech, did Renil decide to go into transportation? “It was a pain point which needed to be relieved. Besides, technology is what makes a big difference in service, and will make a big difference in day-to-day life. My 10-12 years of learning in companies like Cisco is a great help today,” he explains simply. And simplicity is what rules his life, too, despite his affluence: “The only thing that has changed in my lifestyle over the last 18-plus years is that I have a bigger house and a car. I still wear the same brand of shoes, the same type of clothes... I even go to the same biryani centre!” he grins.
‘The taxi service market is projected to grow significantly in the coming years. Clearly, it is underserved and there is still room for new players who can innovate and serve customers better, not just in metro cities but also in tier-II cities’
— Renil Komitla
A part from booking tickets for its customers on other bus operators’ routes—some of the big ones being SRS, VRL, Orange, Morning Star, Kaveri, Diwakar, SRI and Sea Bird— YatraGenie also runs some buses of its own. In March 2015, it launched its city and outstation taxi rental services in Bengaluru. This was only the metro premiere of its cab operations— it already has cabs in 40-plus towns, mainly in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, as well as Karnataka. The towns covered are in Nellore, Tirupati, Gudur, Kavali and Vijayawada Next on the list are Guntur, Rajahmundry and Vishakhapatnam. “Coastal Andhra is my home region,” Renil points out. “We began in small towns, at the rate of one every five months. Our growth has been slow, but good.”
One of the few government-licensed radio taxi operators in the country, YatraGenie will introduce 100 cabs within Bengaluru and 50 for outstation travel to start with. In the coming months, it will partner with other operators to increase these numbers to 1,000 and 500, respectively. “The growing demand for city taxi and outstation taxi services in Bengaluru prompted us to venture into this market,” he said at the launch. “The taxi service market is projected to grow significantly in the coming years. Clearly, it is underserved and there is still room for new players who can innovate and serve customers better, not just in metro cities but also in tier-II cities. By the end of 2015, we will be operating in 65 cities and towns with an inventory of 25,000 cabs.”
The teams at YatraGenie.com and Medkumo keep track of customer requestsBookings can be done on the online portal www.yatragenie.com, as well as through Android-based mobile devices using the YatraGenie app. Apart from web and app bookings, customers can reach out to the call centre. Commuters can now book a mix of cab and bus services for home pick-up and destination drop at home.
“Yatragenie.com is one of the quickly developing cab services and bus ticketing organisations with a workforce of 750 representatives,” its website says. “We are ready to extend services into airlines, hotels/inns and logistics administration.”
The travel portal is run by Terralogic, which is a world-class IT company with diversified workforce in multiple locations—with offices in Bengaluru, San Jose, California and Richardson, Texas, in the US, and now Vietnam and Australia, too, operated and managed by seasoned industry veterans.
In four years, YatraGenie.com, of which he is President and CEO, has grown into one of India’s leading online bus ticketing and cab booking platforms. It provides a one-stop travel solution to customers looking for budget travel. And it now chalks up a gross revenue of Rs.125 crore from a million unique users who make some 5,000 bus bookings a day all over India (against about 20,000 attributed to market leader redBus). It also has taxi fleets in Bengaluru, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Karnataka. “My ambition is to touch 50,000 lives before I retire from this pure-pay transport business,” says Renil. “By then, I want to expand into hospitality also.
The travel portal, also widely referred to in the industry as a Rural Travel Partner, promises to give a world-class travel experience to the populace of India. As of date, it covers most of the major Indian cities for bus travel and radio taxi services to some parts of south India, with a vision to expand into the rest of the country. The model is one that is advantageous to both the clients and the operators. This model is based on the belief of giving its customers the best service at the best price, and works on a commission-based business model which its agents appreciate for its hassle-free, low-cost ticketing service. “We make about 12.5 per cent in the bus and cab business combined,” Renil says. “We hope to increase this with our hotels and bring up the average to 15 per cent.”
“Our associates are the key to our prosperity,” the ‘Careers: Join Us’ section says. “That is why we take a very thoughtful, collaborative approach when making vital employing choices. YatraGenie is a place where capable personalities meet up in a creative, friendly and dynamic workplace. We flourish when our teams are comprised of individuals from diverse backgrounds, cultures, genders, education training, interests, and skills. We trust you can thrive by joining us. If you have the drive and passion to excel, we have the right opportunities for you!”
There is extensive information in the FAQs, from Booking: “Registration is not required to use any of our services. There are no charges for booking a ticket with us”... to Cancellation (possible till four hours before actual journey time) and Boarding and journey, which carries the disclaimer: “YatraGenie is not responsible for the final service provided by the operator. Any issues arising from deficient service from the operator have to be reconciled with the operator itself. However, we would love to hear from you regarding your experience to see if we can educate ourselves and the operators and serve you better. If you face any problem due to a faulty experience with our booking platform, we would be eager to remedy it.
Renil is also Chairman of Komitla Services, which he set up at Nellore in 2004 as a diversified business conglomerate with ventures in transportation, travel, tourism, logistics, IT/ITeS and retail, with a vision of providing global and international experience to the Indian service sector and customers. Additionally, he is Director and Board Member of the Bengaluru-based KINI Pvt. Ltd., established in 2008. KINI is the first-of-its-kind networking, IT and ITeS training company, with a focus on technologies specifically related to the job market. “We at KINI believe that a strong foundation lasts a lifetime,” Renil’s LinkedIn profile says. “We measure return on investment in terms of the group of young professionals that we shape and send off into the corporate world after successfully completing our training programme.”
Another company in which he is a Partner is RRK Holdings LLC, an Angel investment firm he set up in July 2015 in Richardson, Texas in mid-2015. RRK works with early-stage technology companies “looking at contributing to better world”. An even newer interest is Medkumo Software India Pvt. Ltd. in Bengaluru, in which he invested and became a Board Member in September 2015. Medkumo, he explains, is a stealth-mode startup working on innovative solutions in the medical field that will touch every Indian life.
Komitla says all that he is aiming at is to ‘touch lives’. “I want to touch 50,000 lives in whichever way before I retire,” says the 42-year-old. “I’ve touched about 3,000 so far.”
Expansion will be systematic, beginning with tier-II towns: 100 in south India, then Odisha and Maharashtra “where people already know YatraGenie because our buses go there, so we will have a lower spend to create awareness.” Building a network as a chain is best because it makes it easier to spread, he points out, adding: “It has been an interesting journey of four-plus year. Our growth has been slow, but good. I belong to the old school of business, where I only want to make a penny at the end of the year.”
Rama’s Terralogic operates in three different business segments: engineering/software development and product support, strategy and IT, and cloud and SaaS (Software as a Service). It has grown multiple times in just seven years and added world-class networking companies like Juniper Networks, Aruba Networks, Ericsson, Cisco, AT&T, Cable & Wireless, as customers and partners. “Running the company has been a humungous learning experience from every point of view,” she says. “We are working in areas which offer a challenge in day-to-day lives.”
‘I belong to the old school of business, where I only want to make a penny at the end of the year. So I’m not looking at big investments, only nominal ones which will help me take YatraGenie.com to the next level’
—Renil Komitla
Part of this learning has resulted in the setting up of another cloudbased platform, Medkumo. The spark that set Rama off was a dog with an injured spinal cord, which she nursed for eight months. Looking after the animal and taking it to the vet made her realise the problems people too face with visiting hospitals: there are many procedures, and the file gets fatter and fatter as treatment continues—but you have to carry the whole thing with you everywhere, each time you visit the different departments. “People forget to carry the file, or even lose their medical records,” she points out. “And accident victims are most often found to not even be carrying their blood group.”
There is an example right within their family: Renil’s father, for instance, had ‘an issue’, and had to go to hospital at 3:30 in the morning. “He wasn’t carrying anything, so he had to answer questions through his pain,” Renil says. “It took them 48 hours to remove his gall bladder!” With Medkumo, all authentic information will be accessible at one point, not in scattered bits and pieces.
Ergo Medkumo. Founded in 2015, it is working to ‘build a smart demeanour’ of its users towards healthcare. ‘All good things come in a small package and so does Medkumo,’ its profile says. “We provide lead generation for hospitals, growth hacking for clinics and hospitals, and healthcare automation… social media management services like twitter services for hospitals, Facebook marketing for hospitals, social media management for hospitals, content marketing for hospitals, healthcare content marketing, video marketing for hospitals, content plans for hospitals, content management for hospitals and healthcare professionals, digital branding, and brand management to ensure our partner’s digital presence is well managed.”
Says Rama: “We have the best digital marketing experts in India; we assure sheer professionalism. The aim is to not just be digitally present but professionally managed while taking care of the content for blog marketing for hospitals, social media curation, internet marketing, marketing keywords, and SEO (search engine optimisation) services for healthcare of our patrons.” Medkumo is not a hospital management system, she emphasises— it is intended to ease the workflow in medical record systems. “Of course, hospitals also benefit: they can see more patients in less time, because all the medical history is already available on the cloud.
Besides offering reservations on other operators' bus routes, Renil also runs his own buses under the brands of YatraGenie and his family name, KomitlaExplaining that she is really passionate about her venture which offers both patients and hospitals a win-win situation, she points out that it has elements of both commerce and charity. “If you look at the medical care system in New York, for instance, all prescriptions for medicines are now electronic. This is the way to go for India, too!” she exclaims. “We aim to digitise all healthcare-related forums to ensure their digital transformation in healthcare, rendering top-of-the-shelf consistent service which serves you and your family when it really matters. You can now keep your Electronic Medical Record (EMR) along with other useful assistance specially designed for the users.”
Medkumo is backed up by SEO experts as well as digital marketing experts who specialise in hospitals—an “elite management team of Silicon Valley giants constantly striving stubbornly in the smartest way to generate distinct resolution aided by the in-demand proficiently lauded technology”. This makes it the best hospital SEO services provider in India. And it’s not only for human patients, but for animals as well, which was what launched Rama on this path in the beginning. “We have a three-tier system, covering diagnostic centres, veterinary hospitals and global access,” she adds. “We have piloted one of each.”
‘We take a very thoughtful, collaborative approach when making vital employing choices. YatraGenie is a place where capable personalities meet up in a creative, friendly and dynamic workplace. We flourish when our teams are comprised of individuals from diverse backgrounds, cultures, genders, education training, interests, and skills. We trust you can thrive by joining us’
—Renil Komitla
Rama and Renil have a daughter. Trisha, now almost 13, was born while they were still in the US. “My mother-in-law travelled to America to help look after her whenever I needed her,” Rama says. “She has always been there for me. Nothing would have moved without her.” Her father also helped on the field, and with bank work. “So when both Renil and I were fully occupied with work, we had my mother-inlaw for the family and my father to share my work load.” Describing her career as an ‘intoxication’, she says, “This is what preserved my sanity. Having to be on the road constantly, I also practise zumba to stay fit. I am also a zumba instructor.” Zumba, a trademarked exercise programme for fitness, was created by Colombian dancer and cyclist-choreographer Alberto Perez during the 1990s.
Renil, for his part, undertook a 2,000-km walk covering 60 towns in Karnataka, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh to “talk to people and understand their transportation needs”, and is submitting a report to the central and state governments about his findings. “We need a Transport Bill across the country,” says the man who, he points out, was “very clear when I was 22 years old about what I want, and never deviated from that though friends made fun of me.” Today, he is guiding Trisha about the need to “make your own choice, though there are always others who want to make choices for you.”
Why the name YatraGenie? “Most of the tourism in this country is for pilgrimages,” he explains. “The typical small-town idea of a vacation is to go to the temple. So, Yatra. And the Genie part is to show that we offer to make your wish come true.” Expressing his belief that a brand “stays for ever if you do it right”, he says he didn’t choose the Komitla family name as a brand because, with change name, a new non-family person wouldn’t be so interested in the business. “Besides, I don’t believe in dynasty building,” he adds. “Every person should have all freedom to do his or her own thing.” And that is his main satisfaction in life: “I am who I am because I wanted it, not my dad!”
Despite having seen a US$30-million company, Cisco, grow to cross a billion dollars, Renil says he is not looking at making a lot of money. “I belong to the old school of business, where I only want to make a penny at the end of the year,” he reiterates. “So I’m not looking at big investments, only nominal ones which will help me take YatraGenie.com to the next level. Hopefully, this will happen in the next year or two.” With Rama’s Medkumo too growing steadily at the same time and Terralogic having doubled its revenues and employee count over the past couple of years—the two are obviously on a happy and healthy yatra to what has now begun to be termed social entrepreneurship.
BY SEKHAR SESHAN
