The country's largest airline IndiGo on Friday saw its profit after tax slide 18.3 per cent to Rs 2,448.8 crore in the three months ended December 2024 due to foreign exchange loss even as revenue jumped on higher capacity and passenger traffic. The carrier, which had a fleet of 437 planes at the end of December, is planning to induct wet leased planes for long range flights and expects the number of grounded aircraft to come down to 40s by the start of next financial year from the current level of 60s.
IndiGo has delivered impressive operating performance in the past six quarters as it navigated cost and capacity challenges. It has managed to mitigate the impact of faulty engine-related groundings. The airline has also managed costs related to grounding, expensive secondary leasing, increasing airport charges, and pilot compensation inflation and delivered stronger yields and spreads.
The cost available per seat km of an FSC, which used to be Rs 4.60 compared with Rs 2.40 of their low-cost counterpart, has fallen to Rs 3.02, only 25 per cent more than the latter.
Singapore Airlines will make an additional investment of Rs 3,194.5 crore in Tata Group-owned Air India post-merger of Vistara in November. The merger, announced on November 29, 2022, and set to be completed on November 11, 2024, will result in Singapore Airlines having a 25.1 per cent stake in the enlarged Air India. Full-service carrier Vistara, which started flying on January 9, 2015, is a joint venture between Tatas and Singapore Airlines, where the latter holds a 49 per cent shareholding.
'In the inspections, no issues were found with the said locking mechanism.'
The airline operates nearly 950 weekly flights on 28 destinations within and outside of Saudi Arabia.
India has recorded the second-highest increase in domestic airfares in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) and West Asian regions, climbing by 43 per cent in the first half of 2024 compared to pre-pandemic levels in 2019, second only to Vietnam (63 per cent). India ranks third in fare increases during the same period in international skies, behind the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Malaysia. The airfare study conducted by Airports Council International (ACI), which represents 617 airports in this region, was done in partnership with Flare Aviation Consulting.
'This (crash) is one of those times where there is no concrete explanation yet for what happened. I think that adds to my parents' worry.'
Air India has cancelled eight flights, including four international services, on Friday due to enhanced maintenance and operational reasons, the airline said.
Airlines have to deal with high operating costs - fuel, taxation, airport charges - in a very competitive environment.
Indian airline industry is expecting to prune its net losses to Rs 3,000-5,000 crore in this fiscal from an estimated Rs 17,000-17,500 crore in FY2023 on the back of improved yields and stable cost environment, credit ratings agency ICRA said on Tuesday. At the same time, ICRA also estimated that domestic air passenger traffic will expand by 8-13 per cent each in FY2024 and FY2025. The rating agency has also maintained its stable outlook on the industry in view of healthy passenger traffic growth, improved yields and a stable cost environment.
With fewer passengers airlines bracing for a rise in operating costs due to a spike in crude prices
Cooking oil is often discarded after being used for frying at home or in restaurants. However, a refinery of IndianOil has now won a certification to use the same oil to produce sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), the company chairman Arvinder Singh Sahney said.
Why not stream all the data in real time to multiple recipients? It would make the investigation of aviation incidents much easier and far more transparent, recommends Devangshu Datta.
Hyderabad-based Turbo Megha Airways takes off, promising affordable fares and other benefits.
'That refresh programme -- because they are big aircraft and we cannot ground them all at the same time -- will last well into 2027.'
With only a few days to go before the country celebrates Holi, several airline companies offered discounts on fares on the occasion of the festival of colours. While two airlines are providing discounts on both domestic and international networks, another has the offer only for the domestic sector. Low-cost airline Akasa Air said it is offering an all-inclusive one-way fare starting at Rs 1,499 on domestic routes.
Most of them had to wind up operations due to high operating cost, expensive fuel and longer than expected gestation period.
Over the past eight months, a team of 80 people has been diligently working to harmonise operating procedures across four airlines run by the Tata group, as part of two mergers, revealed Campbell Wilson, Air India's chief executive officer (CEO), on Friday. The Tata group is consolidating its aviation business by merging four airlines into two: Air India and Vistara are merging to form a single full-service carrier, while AIX Connect and Air India Express are combining to create a unified low-cost carrier (as a subsidiary of Air India).
Jet fuel constitutes over 40 per cent of an airline's operating costs and the price cut will bring relief to the cash-strapped carriers.
Following a significant power outage, operations at the London Heathrow (LHR) have been suspended till 2359 hours (local time) on March 21 (05.30 am March 22, IST).
Key stimuli of the government's relief package will be a tax break on jet fuel, waiver of parking and landing charges at airports for the next six months and deferment of payment to oil companies by three months.
'We have informed the government multiple times that the situation in the US and India are different.' 'Here, there will be a 500 MHz gap in the frequencies which will safely allow aviation without interference.'
Indigo has zero competition on 61.2 per cent of its 838 domestic routes.
Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Kochi airports have hiked their landing charges by up to 45 per cent, increasing the operating cost for airlines at a time they are facing financial constraints because of the two months of grounding and weak demand.
Some major contracts coming up for renewal include TCS' deals with Star Alliance, a consortium of airlines based in Germany, and Nielsen; Infosys' deals with GE Appliances and Daimler; HCLTech's with UK-based life insurer Chesnara; Wipro's with German electric utility company E.ON and Petrobras of Brazil; and Tech Mahindra's with Circle Health.
Destinations like Coorg, Munnar, the Western Ghats, and parts of the North East, are at their scenic best in the monsoon.
Red Square and VDNKh easily rank among the most striking places I've visited -- both for their historical significance and architectural splendour.
My admiration for Russian culture, vision and ambition grew with every step as I clocked the miles, Nitin Sathe tells us after a visit to Moscow and St Petersburg.
Air India's use of artificial intelligence (AI) has had a huge impact on the airline major's call centre volumes and the technology integration has reduced costs by 100 times, a senior company executive said on Wednesday. The airline launched its own chatbot AI.g, earlier known as Maharaja, in May 2023. The chatbot has answered approximately two million queries since its launch, handling 93 per cent of customer inquiries without needing to pass them on to call centre agents, said Sathya Ramaswamy, Chief Digital and Technology Officer, Air India.
Nearly 80 domestic and international flights received bomb threats in less than 24 hours that later turned out to be hoaxes, keeping thousands of passengers and security agencies on tenterhooks.
'Within five years, we should be achieving more on the international front than what it took most airlines 15 to 20 years back.'
The total cost will include expenses related to crew, fuel, navigation, landing and parking charges.
With the Middle East tensions flaring up, Air India has temporarily suspended its Tel Aviv flights and airlines have charted alternative flight paths to avoid the Iranian airspace.
Pilot groups have accused the AAIB of portraying the pilots as responsible for the incident, with vague and selective presentation of cockpit conversations.
The Director General of Air Operations said "whatever methods and whatever means we have chosen, it had the desired effects on the enemy targets",
From highways connecting once-remote regions to aviation networks carrying millions, India's infrastructure story is one of transformation.
Brent crude oil price surged 4 per cent on Friday, following tension between Iran and the US. Airlines, however, have been unable to pass on the price increase to customers due to the soft demand.
GMR Group-led DIAL, which manages and operates India's largest airport, recently requested the AERA to double the user development fee (UDF) for international business and first-class travellers compared to economy and premium economy over the next four years. It has also sought higher UDF for all domestic passengers flying during peak hours -- 5 am-8:55 am and 5 pm-8:55 pm.
Propelled by strong demand and lower costs, the country's largest airline, InterGlobe Aviation (IndiGo), reported solid operational performance in the 2024-25 (FY25) October-December quarter (Q3). While demand was driven by the festival season, year-end increase, and higher consumer spending, lower fuel and rental costs helped deliver a beat at the operating profit level.
