UPES alumnus launches app to help hotels offer personalised services to guests

Upswing, co-founded by Harsh Mathur, aims to create a revolution in travel and hospitality industry with data-powered immersive solutions

Harsh Mathur, an alumnus of UPES Dehradun, is the proud co-founder of Upswing, a predictive data analytics solutions start-up aimed at the hospitality and travel industry.

Harsh studied B.Tech. in Computer Science and Engineering with specialisation in BFSI from 2014-18, and went on to work as a product engineer with Larsen and Toubro in 2018.

“My batch was the first in this dual degree program. This gave us a lot of opportunities to explore. I have always been the kind of student who wanted to do more than what others were doing and this always motivated me to explore and learn beyond my college’s curriculum,” Harsh says.

Harsh credits UPES for kindling the entrepreneurial spirit in him.

“My entrepreneurial career started in 2015 when Dr. Piyush Chauhan taught us web development and I immediately developed an interest in it. Later Dr. Ranjan Sinha Thakur saw the potential in me and offered me an opportunity to design and develop the website for the UPES library.”

Harsh says that this sole opportunity turned out to be the foundation stone for his career in web design and development. Through the Entrepreneur Cell at UPES, he was able to connect with many early-stage start-ups for whom he built web applications.

“During this entire journey, Ms. Sachi Choudhary, one of our professors, was my constant supporter who helped me in every aspect. She helped me build all the technical skills that helped me stand out from the crowd. She always motivated me to be an entrepreneur and establish my own start-up,” Harsh recalls.

Harsh, however, could not go down that path until after two years. A few months in at L&T, Harsh realised that the 9-5 job was not for him. So, in 2020, Harsh left the organisation to fully start his journey in entrepreneurship.

Thus began Upswing, in collaboration with an acquaintance. The goal was to disrupt the existing big data technology with AI and Blockchain.

Upswing aims to create a revolution in travel and hospitality industry with data-powered immersive solutions. It helps hotels make the most out of their guest data and offer them a holistic personalised experience, thereby increasing brand loyalty, guest experience and revenue, while also ensuring data security.

Many hotels across the globe now realise the power of big data and AI to provide innovative, unmatched guest experience.

This is where Upswing fits in.

Upswing has come up with three innovative apps for hotels: Aura, Alvie and Envoy.

Aura

Aura is Upswing’s hotel-facing app. It is AI and data-powered guest insights platform. Hotels can use Aura to enhance their guests’ experience pre-, during and post-stay. Aura collects data from various fragmented sources such as PMS, CRM online profiles, booking platforms and review portals, to help hotels project a 360 degree view of the guest and engage with them based on actionable insights and suggestions.

Alvie

With Alvie, the guest-facing app, hotels can engage their guests, communicate seamlessly, inspire them to book and create brand loyalty.

Envoy

Envoy, the messenger app helps hotels create cognitive tailored marketing engagements and boost revenue.

Based in Pune, Upswing has recently secured a seed investment through FDI. Harsh heads the overall product engineering and development department at the start-up. Upswing promises to collaborate with numerous industry partners for product and data science related development in the future.