Grab to add HOOQ, Agoda and Booking.com to its super app

Its new services will be available to all users by June.

Grab has launched four new services, comprising hotels booking, on-demand videos streaming, tickets purchasing and trip planner that enables its users to plan their multimodal trips in real-time, an announcement revealed.

The four new services will be progressively rolled out in Singapore and will be available to all users by June 2019.

With the new hotels booking service, Grab users can book hotels and other accommodation from Agoda, and soon, Booking.com directly from the Grab app. They can access and compare prices across the world’s largest selection of 28 million places to stay. Grab has started to roll out 'Hotels' to select Grab users in Singapore, which will be available to all users in May.

Also read: Grab ventures into SME lending and micro-insurance

According to the firm, Grab’s Platinum, Gold and Silver users can redeem vouchers to get up to $20 off hotels booked through Agoda, when spending a minimum of $200. Grab Platinum users can also gain access to Booking.com’s Genius programme and enjoy 10% discounts and other benefits. 

More features and benefits will be added to the ‘Hotels’ service throughout the year. Grab users will get free travel personal accident, flight delay insurance with each hotel booking, special ride offers, and enjoy seamless payments through GrabPay and earn GrabRewards points with every transaction later this year.

For the 89% of Singaporean users who stream videos on their mobiles and others who are looking to do so, Grab will be offering online video content through the app in partnership with HOOQ. Whether they are on a GrabCar ride or waiting for their next GrabFood delivery, Grab users in Singapore can enjoy over 8,000 hours of on-demand streaming of Hollywood blockbusters, regional favourites, and free-to-air content directly through the app.

Starting in May 2019, all Grab users in Singapore get to enjoy two months of free HOOQ content when they subscribe via their Grab app and will enjoy a discounted rate of $7.98/month thereafter, payable with GrabPay.

Meanwhile, Grab’s new ‘Tickets’ service, which will be rolled out by June 2019 in partnership with BookMyShow will allow users to buy movie tickets and in the future, tickets to other events online. In Singapore, ticket revenue represents a $150m market, the firm noted.

The new Trip Planner service will enable Grab users to plan their transit journey with real-time public transportation information and end-to-end directions right in the Grab app. It will be available to all Grab users in Singapore from 23 April.

Also read: Grab launches public transportation Trip Planner app feature in Indonesia

Grab also revealed that it is aiming to have 500 GrabPlatform partners by end-2019. GrabPlatform, which was launched in 2018, is a suite of APIs that give partners access to components of Grab’s technology including transport, logistics, payments, user authentication, messaging, insights and mapping.