Aiming to tap upper class railway passengers, Wadia group promoted budget airline GoAir hopes to fly 50 million people in the next three to five years and add 36 aircraft to its fleet by 2008.
By providing services to unconnected cities, the airline, which commenced its commercial operations on Friday with a Mumbai-Ahmedabad flight, claimed it had brought down air travel cost significantly.
"We are offering the lowest fares in the country. My aim is to convert the AC train travellers. By three to five years, I hope to fly with more than 50 million passengers," Jeh Wadia, managing director, GoAir said.
The company expects a conversion rate of 6 to 8 per cent of as many as 17 million AC-class train travellers in the next five years. With one leased Airbus aircraft in its fleet, the airline presently operates between Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Goa and Coimbatore.
"We will be increasing our fleet strength soon. One more A-320 aircraft will join the fleet by mid-November. And by June next year, we will increase our fleet to six aircraft," Wadia said.
The airline would add 36 aircraft in three years and the fleet would be a mix of leased and acquired airplanes. The company is in discussions with Boeing Co and the Airbus Industrie for the acquisition of more than 50 aircraft for which negotiations are expected to be finalised by the end of this month or December first week.
"We are negotiating with Boeing 737/800 and Airbus A-320. We hope the negotiations will be concluded by this month end or December first week and the first acquired aircraft will join our fleet by June 2006," he said.
Referring to competition from the other no-frills airlines, Wadia said his airline would have a place of its own.
"Every one has got their own markets..Imagine, just 5.5 million people travelled by air last year compared to 110 million in China. The question is about affordability and we will be offering that," Wadia said.
Air travel in the country, which historically grew at a rate of four per cent per annum, jumped to 26 per cent after the introduction of low-cost airlines two years ago.
The airline would operate two flights a day each between Mumbai-Ahmedabad and Mumbai-Goa route. It would operate one flight a day in Mumbai-Coimbatore.
GoAir managing director Jeh Wadia said the objective of GoAir is to commodotise air travel to enable all Indian to fly.
"This, however, is just the first step to a long and successful journey ahead. With GoAir, we promise to deliver to our passengers a quality consistent, quality assured and time efficient product," Wadia said.
Earlier, the maiden flight of GoAir to Goa was inaugurated by Union agriculture minister Sharad Pawar along with Union civil aviation minister Praful Patel.
Additional inputs: Business Standard
