The country's leading low-cost air carriers -- IndiGo, SpiceJet and GoAir -- are set to nearly double their fleet capacity over the next 17 months.
Airline stocks have been soaring following a steep decline in crude oil prices and sustained passenger traffic. Analysts have particularly turned bullish on the stocks of InterGlobe Aviation and SpiceJet. On December 20, shares of InterGlobe Aviation (IndiGo) hit a record high of Rs 3,009 on the BSE, having surged 43.24 per cent year-to-date (YTD).
From croissants to Galouti kebabs and Medu vada, Indian carriers, both low-cost and full-service, are revising their in-flight menus to offer passengers a differentiated fare as competition is heating up amid the boom in air travel with the waning of Covid-19. On Monday, Air India, which was taken over by the Tata Group on January 27, unveiled its new domestic in-flight menu comprising gourmet meals, new appetizers, desserts, and local dishes. Air India's economy class passengers would now be served dishes such as Mushroom cheese omelette, Dry jeera aloo wedges, and Garlic tossed spinach and corn for breakfast, and Vegetable biryani, Malabar chicken curry, and mixed vegetable poriyal for lunch.
An executive of a private airline said even though volume picked up, it will be difficult for airlines to make money as fares have remained low even during festive season.
Air India has leased a fleet of six Airbus A320 neo aircraft from CDB Aviation, a wholly owned Irish subsidiary of China Development Bank Financial Leasing Co Limited, to boost the Tata Group-owned company's transformation journey, a statement said on Wednesday. The leasing agreement was signed on the sidelines of the Airline Economics Growth Frontiers Asia Pacific 2022 conference, said the CDB Asia statement. CDB Aviation is among the first aircraft leasing companies to secure the placement of Air India's additional A320 neo aircraft under the recently announced multi-stage transformation plan since the purchase of the airline by Tata group, which aims to increase the carrier's fleet and help it boost both domestic and international operations.
Air India on Monday said it will lease 12 more aircraft comprising both A320 neo and Boeing 777, which are expected to be inducted in its existing fleet in the first half of 2023. The new planes will be deployed on the airline's short, medium and long-haul international routes, Air India said in a statement. Air India said it has leased 42 aircraft since its privatisation in January this year.
Tata Group, which will now include Air India, Vistara, and Air Asia, has the highest market share of departures on the top 10 routes in the country. According to the data from Caladrius Aero Consulting, which tracked the departure data for eight airlines in August and September, Tata Group is ahead on all the top 10 routes ranked in accordance with the number of departures in August-September 2021. On the top 100 routes in terms of departures, Tata Group is ahead of its chief rival IndiGo on 30 of them.
Asian and Middle Eastern airlines -- but no Indian names -- dominated the Top 10 slots at the World Airline Awards.
Companies across the sector are restructuring payrolls of crew, cutting allowances, and extending leave without pay duration as they realise they will have more aircraft and employees compared to customers.
Tata group-owned Air India plans to hire expat pilots for its Boeing 777 planes as the airline is facing a shortage of pilots amid plans to expand its fleet as well as international operations, according to sources. The carrier is looking to rope in around 100 pilots for the wide-body Boeing 777 fleet and has approached various agencies that provide expat flight crew to airlines, the sources told PTI. The loss-making Air India, which was under government ownership for nearly seven decades till the Tata group took over in January 2022, had stopped hiring expat pilots many years ago to save costs.
The plane that took off from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates carrying 303 Indian passengers, including many minors, was grounded at the Chalons-Vatry airport in Marne on Thursday.
About 350 Boeing 737 Max 8 are currently in service with airlines around the world, with thousands more on order. Boeing insists it has no reason to pull the popular aircraft from the skies.
Hyderabad-based Turbo Megha Airways takes off, promising affordable fares and other benefits.
Rising crude oil prices and muted passenger traffic in the July-September quarter (second quarter, or Q2) of 2023-24 (FY24) have raised concerns about the profitability of listed aviation players. These two concerns have caused the stock of InterGlobe Aviation (IndiGo), the largest player in the sector, to slip by 11 per cent since its highs at the end of July. Nuvama Research expects yields to cool down in the near term due to seasonality, rising crude oil prices, and higher capacity.
The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) on Thursday reserved its order on crisis-hit airline Go First's plea seeking voluntary insolvency resolution proceedings and interim moratorium on financial obligations while aircraft lessors vehemently opposed the petition. Amid the airline facing severe financial crunch and cancelling flights, a two-member NCLT bench comprising Justice Ramalingam Sudhakar and Member L N Gupta heard the arguments for and against the petition for nearly four hours. As aircraft lessors opposed the plea, the counsels for Go First said the petition was not a malicious one to avoid payment of dues to its creditors but to save the company.
The airline operates nearly 950 weekly flights on 28 destinations within and outside of Saudi Arabia.
The government is keeping its options open.
A red-faced Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) was forced to issue a clarification on Friday after the State-owned carrier received much flak for its bizarre dress code for its cabin crew, instructing them that wearing undergarments underneath the uniform was a must.
West Asian carriers are up against Air India and IndiGo in the battle for seats on lucrative international routes.
It offers a real opportunity for the flag carrier to compete on the world stage, backed by a leading conglomerate with deep pockets like the Tatas, observes Indrajit Gupta.
Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia on Tuesday flew on SpiceJet's special flight between Delhi and Gwalior using Boeing's 737 Max plane that has been allowed to return to service after two and half years. All Max planes were grounded in India by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on March 13, 2019, three days after the crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 Max plane near Addis Ababa, which had left 157 people, including four Indians, dead. Along with Scindia, SpiceJet CMD Ajay Singh and Boeing India president Salil Gupte were also present on the special flight on Tuesday.
India's aviation regulator DGCA on Thursday lifted the ban on Boeing 737 Max planes' commercial flight operations after almost two-and-half years. On March 13, 2019, all Boeing 737 Max planes were grounded in India by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) after the crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 Max plane on March 10 near Addis Ababa which had left 157 people, including four Indians, dead. Aircraft manufacturer Boeing has been modifying the 737 Max plane since March 2019 so that various countries' regulators, including the DGCA, permit its passenger flight operations again.
The order, valued at 'nearly $9 billion at list prices', was signed at Dubai Air Show 2021 on Tuesday.
These airports are those at Amritsar, Varanasi, Bhubaneswar, Indore, Raipur and Trichy.
In 2014, about 650,000 customers used Emirates' Wi-Fi service on board.
Jet Airways remains the number one airline serving foreign routes.
Despite the best ever quarterly net profit of Rs 3,091 crore during April-June of financial year 2023-24 (Q1FY24), challenges are mounting for InterGlobe Aviation-run IndiGo in the near term, said analysts. Given this, most brokerages have retained their ratings from 'buy to underperform', as well as their target price for the stock. For instance, Motilal Oswal Financial Services has retained its 'neutral' rating on the scrip as it believes the low-cost airline is facing teething issues at present.
Both Jet Airways and Go First have met with a similar fate of landing up in insolvency, albeit for different reasons. Whether Go First will be able to avoid the sharp erosion in value like in the case of Jet, experts say, will depend on how quickly it is able to restart operations and retain its slots at airports. Go First, owned by the Wadia group, filed for voluntary corporate insolvency resolution on May 2 due to inadequate capacity utilisation that led to a cash crunch.
Seeking to further democratise air travel with dependable and affordable services, airline Akasa Air is aiming to start flights in late May or early June after getting its first Boeing 737 MAX aircraft in April. Bullish on the long term growth potential of the country's civil aviation sector, ace investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala-backed carrier is looking to have 18 planes in its fleet by the end of March 2023. Despite COVID clouds continuing to cast a shadow on the airlines, Akasa Air CEO Vinay Dube is more than optimistic as he asserted that "if you look at the long term future of commercial aviation in India, it is as exciting as anywhere in the world".
Alliance Air, which is the largest regional airline, is currently operating 77 daily flights compared to 126 last year.
Indian aviation regulator DGCA has barred 90 SpiceJet pilots from operating the Boeing 737 Max aircraft after finding them not properly trained. "For the moment, we have barred these pilots from flying the Max and they have to retrain successfully for flying the aircraft," DGCA chief Arun Kumar said in a statement. He also said that the regulator will take "strict action against those found responsible for the lapse."
'For the moment, we have barred these pilots from flying the Max and they have to retrain successfully for flying the aircraft,' DGCA chief Arun Kumar said in a statement.
When the Tatas re-boarded Air India on January 27 last year, the price of aviation turbine fuel was at over Rs 80,000 per kilolitre. Rupee was trading at around Rs 74 to a US dollar. The Omicron variant of Covid-19 was in prevalence - barely a week earlier, India had reported over 340,000 cases on a single day. Seven-day home quarantine of international travellers was the norm.
Tata Sons has started the process of due diligence of state-owned Air India and its subsidiary Air India Express. Sources said the group has appointed Bain and Company and Seabury Group for this purpose. Once complete, a financial bid will be submitted and a deal to take over the airline is likely to fructify by end of this year or even earlier, people involved in the process said. Simultaneously, the group has brought in veterans in the aviation business from Delta and United Airlines to prepare a plan for post-merger integration of Air India with its existing airline ventures. Tata Sons operates Vistara - a 51:49 percent joint venture with Singapore Airlines and Air Asia India, in which Tatas hold 83.67 per cent stakes.
Most airlines lose 30 pilots a year. Vistara has lost only 2 in 18 months.
Air travel penetration in India remains small in global terms, with 0.04 annual trips per capita against 0.3 in China and more than two in the United States.
'I am seven months into the job, but it feels like seven years.'
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