Monitise-powered app sees nearly half a million downloads and over 90,000 ticket sales in first six months

Monitise (LSE: MONI), a global leader in Mobile Money, is proving how mobile can transform customer engagement in the travel industry six months after the launch of its app for Pegasus Airlines, the leading low-cost airline in Turkey. In the first week since its launch in 2013, ‘Pegasus Airlines Mobile’ became the most downloaded travel app in Turkey’s App Store, with more than 450,000 downloads.

Monitise designed and developed the new version of Pegasus Airlines Mobile, Turkey’s first iOS 7-compatible airline application in December 2013, as well as an Android application in January 2014. In its first six months, the new app has had over 283,000 downloads on iPhone and 175,000 on Android. 5,000 new users continue to register every month, with 1.7 million monthly views and 23,000 check-ins. The app has created a new channel that enriches the airline’s customer relationships, with 18,000 tickets sold through the app per month, as well as in-flight meal and seat reservation purchases.

The uptake of the app and its ability to drive customer engagement has been thanks to a combination of intuitive and sophisticated design, which uses rich imagery of destinations and products, with simple-to-use features that enable the user to easily complete their journey from purchase to landing. Available in English and Turkish, the app allows users to purchase tickets and store them to a Passbook, check-in and access flight status updates, and choose and pre-pay for seats and in-flight meals. It also offers access to the Pegasus loyalty programme and its benefits.

“The success of the app confirms our belief that mobile will form an absolutely integral part of the future of air travel,” said Didem Namver, Digital Marketing Manager at Pegasus Airlines. “We seized the opportunity to deliver an amazing end-to-end journey for mobile – a natural travel companion in itself. The results show how the business has experienced the benefits of using mobile to deliver a truly customer-centric experience.”

Fatih İşbecer, CEO of Monitise MEA, said:  “With Pegasus Airlines, we’re proud of having created a service where you can really see the material results of enhancing customer engagement via mobile. This is what can be achieved when break-through, intuitive mobile design becomes a key differentiator. For us, this is just as important as having glowing user reviews in the App Store and Google Play.”

Peter Radcliffe, President International at Monitise, added: “As an industry, travel is perhaps one of the most inherently mobile and one that’s ripe for innovation. This is where a product like Pegasus Airlines Mobile and Monitise’s expertise helps bring the travel industry into a new era of consumer behaviour, seeking new opportunities to not just compete, but grow. We look forward to helping create a truly mobile future for the travel industry.”

The success of the mobile application and its opening of new revenue streams are set against a backdrop of renewed success for Pegasus Airlines. The business increased its 2013 revenue by 25 percent year-on-year, to 2.4 billion Turkish Lira. Gross profit rose to over 450 million Turkish Lira, translating to an increase of 41 percent year-on-year.