- Thomas Cook (India) is fundamentally a one-stop shop for anyone leaving or entering India - it sells the foreign currency, books the trip, runs the resort at the destination, and even captures the souvenir photograph, all under brands that have been trusted for decades. The company was incorporated in 1978, with roots tracing back to 1881, and is now part of the Fairfax Group, having secured perpetual rights to the Thomas Cook brand across India, Sri Lanka and Mauritius for a one-time payment, which means no competitor can use the name in its core markets. The recurring approach that explains everything else is a “customer-first mindset” delivered through a hybrid of physical and digital networks, where the group integrates back-end operations across its brands to drive efficiency while keeping each brand independent at the shop window.
Business segments
Five engines at different stages - a cash-generating foreign exchange franchise, a globe-spanning travel platform, a fast-expanding resort network, and a niche imaging business - each built on the customer relationships of the one before.
1. Financial Services: the foreign exchange engine that funds the rest
India’s largest non-bank foreign exchange provider runs a zero-risk, high-float model where it earns a spread on every currency transaction and interest on the cash loaded onto its prepaid cards - and it keeps those customers for years.
- The licence is the moat - it holds the first and only perpetual RBI Authorised Dealer Category II licence given to a non-bank, with its own SWIFT membership and a dedicated in-house dealing room, so it can trade currency directly without depending on a bank partner.
- No bets on currency direction - every position is fully hedged, meaning the business carries no proprietary foreign exchange risk; it simply earns the margin between buy and sell rates, making its income structural rather than a gamble on the rupee.
- The prepaid card locks customers in - with roughly one-third market share and a typical customer lifecycle of five years, the forex card creates durable stickiness; the float (cash sitting on loaded cards) has grown from INR 4 billion to INR 16 billion in five years, and the interest earned on that float is a powerful margin driver.
- It reaches the traveller wherever they are - distribution spans over 130 branches, 17 airport counters, over 3,100 agent partners, and digital channels including its own app, WhatsApp, Blinkit (in 12 cities), and Google Pay, so a customer can buy currency or load a card in under an hour from their living room.
2. Travel & Related Services: the trip-booking platform that spans the globe
India’s largest integrated travel services platform is an asset-light, B2B-heavy machine that moves over 100,000 MICE delegates a year, serves 800 corporate clients, and sells packaged holidays to consumers - all while owning no planes or hotels.
- Scale and multi-brand control are the advantage - operating across 23 countries with over 6,500 partners, the segment runs two consumer brands (Thomas Cook and SOTC) and multiple B2B brands, giving it negotiating power with airlines and hotels that smaller rivals cannot match.
- MICE moves masses - the meetings-and-events business managed over 420 groups and more than 100,000 passengers in FY26, including government-scale operations like the 38th National Games where it handled a 20,000-member contingent, 67,000 room nights, and 610,000 meals.
- Destination Management is the inbound engine - through subsidiaries like Asian Trails (Southeast Asia), Desert Adventures (Middle East), and Allied T Pro (North America), the group designs itineraries for overseas tour operators bringing tourists into those regions; it is a B2B play that never touches the end consumer directly.
- Leisure holidays are the consumer face - selling packaged tours under Thomas Cook and SOTC, the B2C business skews heavily toward long-haul destinations (62% of sales) and sees a repeat customer ratio of 24%, with products like TravSure protection and Visa Rejection Cover designed to reduce the anxiety that stops people from booking.
3. Leisure Hospitality & Resorts: the owned-and-managed resort network
Sterling Holiday Resorts is a fast-expanding, debt-free hospitality business that has transformed from selling long-duration memberships into a straightforward hotel operation - and it is being demerged into a separate listed company.
- From membership model to pure hospitality - the business phased out the sale of 25-year memberships by July 2023 and stopped acquiring new 10-year memberships by September 2024, shifting entirely to FITs (free independent travellers), F&B, MICE, and weddings, which is why the guest ratio of direct guests versus members reached 81% in the most recent quarter.
- Asset-right, not asset-heavy - 62% of rooms are owned or leased (P&L-led) and 38% are managed, so the business gets the operational control of owned inventory while using the managed model to scale faster without tying up capital.
- A demerger to unlock focus - the Board approved spinning off Sterling into a separate listed entity, with TCIL shareholders receiving 0.81 shares of the new company for every TCIL share; the parent will continue to hold its existing stake, and the move is designed to let TCIL concentrate on its core travel and financial services engines.
4. Digital Imaging Solutions: the souvenir photograph business at the world’s busiest attractions
DEI is a global imaging platform that captures and sells photographs at 264 iconic sites - from the Burj Khalifa to Universal Beijing Resort - earning a fee on every click.
- Per-capture economics at scale - the business completed 108 million captures in FY26, earning revenue through per-photo sales, pre-sold bundles, e-commerce, and video capture services at attractions like aquariums, theme parks, snow parks, and luxury hotels.
- The partnership roster is the barrier to entry - marquee relationships include Burj Khalifa, Atlantis Dubai, Universal Studios Singapore, Shanghai Disney Resort, and Marina Bay Sands; once an imaging contract is embedded inside a major attraction, it is difficult for a competitor to dislodge.
Group structure and partners
The group is a federation of 16 brands held together by a common promoter, shared back-end functions, and a web of wholly owned and joint-venture subsidiaries that extend its reach from Cyprus to Australia.
- Fairfax is the controlling shareholder - Fairbridge Capital (Mauritius) Limited, a subsidiary of Fairfax Financial Holdings, holds a 63.83% stake, providing the group with a deep-pocketed, long-term oriented promoter.
- SOTC is the sister brand under the same roof - SOTC Travel Limited is a step-down Fairfax subsidiary held through TCIL, active across leisure, incentive, and business travel with a legacy of over seven decades; TCIL and SOTC integrated their product, contracting, operations, and call-centre functions to drive synergies while keeping the consumer brands separate.
- Joint ventures fill specific gaps - TCI-Go Vacation India is a JV with Germany’s REWE Group for European inbound travel; Allied New World LLC is a 50:50 back-office JV with New World Travel Inc.; Indian Horizon Marketing Services is a 50:50 JV with Atirath Technologies to co-develop a Travel AI platform for the Indian market.
- A corporate restructuring is underway - a Composite Scheme of Arrangement approved in March 2026 will demerge the resorts business into a separate listed Sterling entity, consolidate TCIL’s share capital, and merge three dormant wholly owned subsidiaries into the parent, streamlining the group structure.