How Gumo Is Building an AI Co-Pilot for Travel Planning

Planning a holiday is supposed to be exciting, but for many travellers, deciding where to go, where to stay, and what to do has become a time-consuming task. From Instagram reels and YouTube videos to hotel reviews, travel blogs, and booking platforms, travellers often have to go through dozens of sources before making a decision.

Bengaluru-based traveltech startup Gumo is trying to make this process simpler with artificial intelligence. The company believes that travel platforms have focused heavily on bookings, while the earlier stage of travel planning—discovering destinations and deciding what fits a traveller's needs—still has significant gaps.

Founded in 2023 by travel enthusiasts Mohammad Shakir, Manish Narang, and Kapil Sharma, Gumo positions itself as an AI-powered travel co-pilot that helps users move from inspiration to planning and eventually to execution.

The startup currently has a 12-member team, with Shakir serving 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.

Solving the travel decision problem

According to Shakir, the way travellers discover and plan holidays has changed considerably. Social media has become an important source of travel inspiration, with people discovering destinations, hotels, restaurants, and even complete itineraries through platforms such as Instagram and YouTube.

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

This growing volume of information, however, has also made travel planning more complicated.

Travellers may know what kind of holiday they want but still struggle to decide which destination, hotel, or experience is right for them. They often move between social media platforms, review websites, hotel booking platforms, and search engines before reaching a decision.

Shakir believes this is the “decision layer” of travel, which remains largely unsolved.

“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,” he says.

Gumo has designed its platform around this problem. Its app is available on both the Google Play Store and Apple App Store and allows users to bring information from different sources into one place.

For example, users can share links from Instagram, YouTube, or online travel agencies with Gumo. Its AI co-pilot then uses that information to create a visual travel map and bucket list.

The idea is to allow users to save travel inspiration as they discover it instead of having to start their planning process from scratch every time.

Personalised recommendations instead of generic ratings

Gumo is also trying to make hotel and property research more personalized.

Traditional travel platforms generally rely on ratings and reviews that are the same for every customer. A hotel may have a four-star rating, but that does not necessarily tell a traveller whether it is suitable for their particular trip.

Gumo's approach is based on what an individual traveller is looking for.

Its Personalised Match Score evaluates a property based on the user's specific requirements. For instance, a family looking for a sea-facing villa with a swimming pool may receive a different assessment from a couple looking for a quiet property for a weekend getaway.

“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,” Shakir explains.

The platform also analyses information from sources such as Reddit, YouTube, and Instagram to help travellers understand properties beyond standard booking-site reviews.

Gumo says it is building what it calls a personal travel context graph. The system learns from users' saves and shares to understand their preferences over time.

This context-based approach is one of the company's main differences from traditional travel search platforms.

Instead of asking users to enter every detail into a search box, Gumo wants to start with information that travellers have already shared or saved.

Sharma explains that a traveller might already have a preference for experiential travel, relaxation, adventure, or spiritual trips. Gumo uses such information to develop a profile and provide recommendations based on that context.

“What we are doing at Gumo is starting the journey from the context you've already shared with us,” Sharma says.

Growing user base and retention

Gumo says its user base has been growing rapidly. The company currently has around 22,000 monthly active users.

According to Shakir, the startup grew from 5,000 monthly active users in January to 22,000 in March 2026, representing four-times growth in less than 90 days.

The company also claims that its retention is more than twice the typical benchmark for travel applications.

Gumo has crossed 50,000 downloads on Android and more than 10,000 downloads on iOS.

The company believes that retention is particularly important in the travel industry because travellers have little reason to remain loyal to a single booking platform.

A user may compare the price of the same hotel across MakeMyTrip, Booking.com, Cleartrip, and other platforms before making a booking. Since switching between services is easy, traditional travel platforms can find it difficult to build long-term relationships with customers.

Gumo wants to address this by becoming part of the travel planning process before a customer reaches the booking stage.

“Our strategy is to solve this by building a persistent, intelligent layer above these transaction platforms,” Shakir says.

The company believes that by understanding travel intent early and helping customers make decisions, it can create stronger engagement than a platform that is used only when someone wants to make a booking.

Building for a changing travel market

Gumo expects AI to play a larger role in travel planning in the coming years.

Shakir believes the industry could eventually move towards autonomous travel execution, where AI assists travellers throughout the journey—from discovering destinations and researching hotels to booking trips and handling post-trip requirements.

The company sees an opportunity in the growing popularity of shorter and more frequent holidays, particularly weekend trips and leisure travel.

Gumo says the global travel industry is expected to grow significantly, while India's travel market is also expanding as more consumers travel for leisure and take shorter trips.

At the same time, travel discovery is increasingly happening through social media. This has created a situation where inspiration is easier to find but planning can become more fragmented.

Gumo is currently being used across 25 countries, with around 10% of its users coming from international markets. The startup has also seen early traction in the US, UK, and UAE.

The company competes with established online travel agencies such as Cleartrip as well as broader AI platforms such as ChatGPT. The broader growth of AI-powered digital platforms, including businesses such as heloix.com, also reflects how startups are using technology to create more personalised online experiences. However, Gumo believes its focus on the travel decision-making process gives it a specific position in the market.

Funding and the road ahead

Gumo started with an initial funding of Rs 25 lakh and recently raised $100,000 in an angel round led by boAt co-founder Sameer Mehta and Fractional CHRO Martin Gomez.

The startup plans to continue growing through social media-led distribution and product-led growth.

Shakir says Gumo is focusing on user-generated content to attract new travellers while expanding into high-intent markets such as the US and UK.

The company is also working on improving its hotel research and booking experience. By combining discovery, personalised recommendations, and booking-related features, Gumo wants to increase both acquisition and repeat usage.

The immediate goal is to reach one lakh active users.

For Gumo, the larger opportunity is not simply to become another travel booking platform. Instead, it wants to become the layer that helps travellers decide what they actually want before they make a booking.

As travellers continue to discover destinations through social media and rely more heavily on AI for recommendations, the way people plan holidays could change significantly.

Gumo is betting that the future of travel will not only be about finding the cheapest flight or hotel. It will also be about having an AI co-pilot that understands personal preferences, reduces the number of choices, and helps turn scattered inspiration into an actual trip.

Travel technology companies such as Gumo show how AI is changing the way consumers discover and plan experiences. As this space develops, businesses that combine personalisation with useful customer experiences could have an important role in the next phase of digital travel.