Bengaluru-based startup Gumo is trying to change that. The company believes that modern travel has a discovery problem as much as a booking problem, and it wants to solve that with AI.

Founded in 2023 by travel lovers Mohammad Shakir, Manish Narang, and Kapil Sharma, the startup positions itself as an online travel co-pilot built around personalisation. Gumo is a travel platform that helps travellers navigate decision fatigue intelligently, guiding them from inspiration to itinerary.

The startup has a 12-member team, with Shakir as CEO, Narang as CTO, and Sharma as COO.

"In the last two decades, many platforms like MakeMyTrip have come up, but they all largely focus on optimising transactions and monetising bookings. They don't actually help the customer execute trips better. That's where we come in," Shakir tells YourStory.

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A platform that understands decision fatigue

Shakir says that the way people approach travel has fundamentally changed in the last few years. Instead of browsing blogs, many users now discover destinations, and even the itineraries, through social media.

According to a report by Trip.com and Google, in markets such as India, Thailand, and Indonesia, more than 75% of people watch travel-related livestreams.

"The 'decision layer', the part where you actually figure out where to go and which hotel to pick, has remained largely unsolved. This has created a lot of decision fatigue. It is so prevalent that travel has become the second most used category for consumers within AI tools," Shakir shares.

The Gumo app, available on Google Play Store and the Apple App Store, is designed to capture travel intent from the earliest stage of inspiration. Users can share links from Instagram, YouTube, or even an online travel agency (OTA), and Gumo's co-pilot will convert that information into a visual travel map and bucket list.

To help users judge whether a property suits them, the platform also analyses multiple sources, including Reddit, YouTube, and Instagram, to generate unbiased reviews.

"One of our core features is the Personalised Match Score. Unlike a generic 4-star rating, this score is unique to you. If you tell Gumo you want a sea-facing villa with a pool for a trip with your kids, the AI will tell you if a property is a 95% match for your specific requirements," he says.

"We are building a personal travel context graph that learns from your saves and shares to move beyond static planning."

Sharma says Gumo's biggest differentiator is its context-based approach, rather than the traditional search-led model where users manually enter every detail.

"What we are doing at Gumo is starting the journey from the context you've already shared with us, whether that's a desire for experiential travel, a relaxing trip, or something spiritual. We use that specific context to build a consumer profile that allows us to solve decision fatigue right then and there," the COO explains.

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Traction, growth, and the future

Gumo currently has around 22,000 monthly active users (MAUs) and Shakir says the startup is continuing to grow.

"Gumo scaled four times in under 90 days, growing from 5,000 MAUs in January to 22,000 in March 2026. Driven by strong engagement and repeat usage, we saw over two times higher retention than typical travel apps. We've also crossed over 50,000 downloads on Android and over 10,000 on iOS," he says.

Looking at the wider travel platform market, Shakir believes a major structural issue remains: switching costs for consumers are close to zero. Travellers often compare prices across multiple apps like MakeMyTrip or Booking.com, with little loyalty to any one platform. This translates into low retention across the category.

"Our strategy is to solve this by building a persistent, intelligent layer above these transaction platforms. By capturing travel intent early and acting as a co-pilot, we create a 'stickiness' that doesn't exist in the current market. In fact, we are already seeing that our product retention is twice the typical travel category benchmark," he says.

Shakir adds that the industry is likely to move toward autonomous travel execution, where AI supports users across the entire journey-from research and booking to post-trip needs. He believes the travel market, especially leisure travel and weekend getaways, is not just growing but structurally shifting.

"Globally, travel is a $11.7 trillion industry expected to reach $16.5 trillion by 2035, with a clear behavioural change from one annual vacation to multiple shorter, high-frequency trips."

"In India, this is even more pronounced. Discovery for these trips has already moved to social media, making travel planning more inspiration-led but also more fragmented. At the same time, the market is scaling from $42.85 billion in 2024 to $75.3 billion by 2030."

Gumo is already used across 25 countries, with around 10% of users coming from international markets, including early traction in the US, the UK, and the UAE.

Competing with OTAs like Clear Trip and horizontal AI platforms like ChatGPT, Gumo says it is carving out space by owning the travel decision layer.

With an initial funding of Rs 25 lakh, the traveltech startup recently raised $100,000 in an angel round by boAt co-founder Sameer Mehta and Fractional CHRO Martin Gomez.

"We're scaling through a combination of social-led distribution and product-led growth loops. We're doubling down on UGC-led acquisition and expanding into high-intent markets like the US and the UK. Combined with stronger hotel research and booking flows, this drives both acquisition and repeat usage, and gives us a clear, compounding path to one lakh active users," Shakir says.