About OYO Rooms Budget Lodging Website Merbok
OYO Rooms is a budget lodging website for 450,000 accommodations in over 500 cities. It was founded by RiteshAgarwal and owned by Oravel Stays Private Limited in 2013. It started in Gurgaon, Haryana, India. However, it quickly extended operations all over Asia and Europe. Ritesh was just an 18-year-old boy in 2012 when he launched Oravel Stays which was also a website for listing and booking budget lodging. After three months of studying that market by staying in over 100 bed and breakfast homes, guest houses, and mini hotels, he gave sent Oravel to OYO in 2013. When Ritesh launched Oravel Stays, he received a grant of $100,000 as part of the Thiel Fellowship, which was an early sign that OYO was going to be yet another hit. And it was.
In 2019, OYO rooms imposed a threat on its customers when it planned to implement a digital register mechanism, which allow real-time customer data sharing with the government. Since OYO has a bigger client base of unmarried couples than families, the move was deemed truly controversial. A year prior to this, they also faced a sexual harassment case when a US citizen that booked lodging via OYO allegedly claimed that she was harassed in Delhi. Still, OYO maintained that a few cases are not even significant at all compared to their million check-ins.
