Well the concept is same, give customers/tax payers a web based easy to use platform to fill out their tax forms. The four partners includes Nitin Vyakaranam, founder and director, and other three ISB alumni GK, SL and NG and AN (these are the names, TaxYantra blog has mentioned). I have sent an email to TaxYantra to get some more insight about the company and co-founders.
What I found out from their blog (which I believe is written by Nitin) is that the idea about this "e-filing" struck back in October 2006 and GK and Nitin started working on this initially followed by SL and NG and AV. NG joined as product manager and AN handeled the marketing.
But the question here is, TaxSmile also promote their site as "First online filing" and TaxYantra as well promote their site as "First". So who would you consider as the first in this league. They both started at the same time and I would assume that they both have tough competition followed by "I believe" few more players in this line as India is full of herd mentality. The time will tell how its going to perform but I wish best of luck to the team.
I will keep you guys posted if I hear anything back from TaxYantra founders.