Treetle.com, India’s first online location–based interest network has launched its services across the country. Treetle is the country’s first utility that helps individuals connect with other like minded people within their neighbourhood, locality or town to engage in activities based on their personal interests. Treetle has been launched in the wake of an increasing need to engage with people outside the virtual world, pursue interests and lead a more fulfilling life.

In evidence of the growing interest in connecting with the real world, and a yearning to engage, is the rousing success of the private beta version in Bangalore. Within a short span of three months, over 70 clubs have been set up across several interests including biking, flying, animal care and music, with very active members who regularly meet offline for their club events.

With an easy-to-use interface, Treetle’s platform enables any user to form a club based on his or her interests. Through Treetle’s unique networks, members of a club can create a calendar of events for their clubs, automatically invite club members to activities, host and execute events using Treetle. This is an ideal platform for people looking to connect with other like minded people to pursue their interests and hobbies. Apart from interest-based clubs, Treetle also provides a platform for NGOs and local merchants to engage in a much more focused and meaningful way with their target audience.

Treetle was founded by Pankaj Dugar after a successful run of two decades, across India and the US, with firms including Cisco, Infosys and McKinsey. Speaking on how he started Treetle, Pankaj said, “My family and I moved multiple times in multiple years, and each time we had to spend a lot of energy getting to know our neighbours and find those who were interested in the things we were interested in - so we could easily get together for a specific sport or activity.  I knew there had to be an easier way, so started to think about a website where people could list out there interests and find people around them who shared those interests.  As I began talking to a few people, I realized this idea had a lot more potential.  This led to Treetle”.

Regular users creating interest-specific clubs and NGOs do not have to pay anything to use Treetle.  Treetle is now available in over 3400 cities in India, with plans for launching outside India over the next two quarters.