Category Archives: Aviation

“Rumours regarding Air India shutting down or closing operations are all baseless,” Air India CMD Ashwani Lohani said in a tweet. His statement read, “Rumours regarding Air India shutting down or closing operations are all baseless. Air India would continue to fly and also expand and there should be no cause for concern whatsoever to travellers, corporates or agents. Air India the national carrier is still the biggest airline of India.” In a bid to cut down its losses, the national carrier has recently ended the 20-year-old partnership with Sabre on account of higher premium and has entered into a partnership with Amadeus GDS. Sabre was the second-largest GDS for Air India after Travelport with nearly 25 per cent share in international GDS sphere of the airline. Air India had ended its GDS partnership with Amadeus for the domestic segment in December 2018. Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri had clarified on December 31, 2019 that the national carrier, which is incurring a loss of Rs 20-26 crore daily, will keep on running till it is privatised. While Air India’s net loss in 2018-19 was around Rs 8,556 crore, its current total debt is around Rs 80,000 crore.

Air passenger numbers across India are expected to reach 4.72 billion in 2020, according to International Air Transport Association (IATA). The forecast shows an increase of 4% from 4.54 billion in 2019. A statement, released by IATA, said, “Passenger demand (RPKs) is expected to grow 4.1% in 2020, in line with 4.2% growth in 2019. In fact, this masks a GDP-growth-driven pick-up since the underlying growth rate fell to less than 4.0% in 2019. However, whereas passenger capacity (ASKs) rose 3.5% in 2019, it is forecast to grow 4.7% in 2020 – as aircraft deliveries rise significantly, causing load factors to slide to 82% from 82.4% in 2019. This will maintain pressure on yields, which are expected to slide 1.5% after falling 3.0% in 2019. Passenger revenues, excluding ancillaries, are expected to reach $581 billion (up 2.5% from $567 billion in 2019).

Ethiopian Airlines is looking to expand in the south Indian market with the launch of its Chennai flights to its capital. Sharing more details is Tadesse Tilahun, Regional Director, India Sub Continent, Ethiopian Airlines, who bid goodbye to the India market after completing a stint of 7.5 years. He says, “We have seen that the south India market has huge potential and is a growing market. To tap this, we have just finalised launch of Chennai operations. We will be starting this from April 3, 2020 with three frequencies per week. We recently launched Bengaluru operations connecting Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa with a direct flight with four frequencies on 787 aircraft. This takes a total of seven flights, daily operations out of the south region to our capital.” Ethiopian Airlines also welcomed its new Regional Director, Tigist Eshetu.

Hardeep Singh Puri, Minister of State, Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA), has said that MoCA will be issuing expression of interest for Air India disinvestment within next few weeks. Talking about Air India disinvestment, he revealed, “Air India is a national asset and the Maharaja is a great brand. The problem with Air India is that it has an unsustainable debt. We tried two years ago for the same, which proved to be less successful, and we have learnt from the same. It is our endeavour now that we will be issuing an expression of interest in the coming few weeks, hopefully sooner or later, and that the process of privatisation will then follow. We should ensure that we find a buyer and we have to deal with an interim process,” he said.

Hardeep Singh Puri, Minister of State (I/C) for Civil Aviation has launched the Biometric enabled Centralised Access Control System (CACS) and e-BCAS Project Training Module. The two projects launched are important milestones to enhance security and ease of doing business at airports. Covering 43 Airports of AAI and 5 Joint Venture airports at present, the CACS project is aimed to digitise the employee movement process at the airports. The e-BCAS Project: Training Module is aimed at helping more than 1.5 lac employees of various stakeholders by migrating from manual process of training to digital platform. Puri said “CACS project shall facilitate the ease of processing, enhanced security and prevent unauthorized entry into airport, alert authorities to an attempted intrusion or other irregularities for an immediate response; overall not only leading to ease of doing business, but also an enhanced security system.” CACS project is bound to assist around 2 Lakhs employees of various stakeholders who move in & out of the airport on a daily basis, he added.

Air India is going to start bi-weekly direct flights between Bhubaneswar and from January 20, 2020, informed Usha Padhee, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Civil Aviation in a tweet. The flight, AI A321 will operate on Mondays and Thursdays at 8:40 am from Bhubaneswar and from Surat at 8:30 am on Fridays and Sundays. The lowest fare quoted on Air India’s website is Rs 4503. In the return direction, the lowest fare for which tickets are on sale is Rs 4213. The flight was a long-standing demand of leaders of Odisha community in Surat. Notably, the diamond city of Gujarat has Odia population of around 2.5 lakh. In August 2019, Chief Minister of Odisha, Naveen Patnaik had requested Civil Aviation Minister, Hardeep Singh Puri to consider the demand to start a direct flight between both the city. The flight was earlier expected to start from January 1.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) forecast that the global airline industry will produce a net profit of $29.3 billion in 2020, improved over a net profit of $25.9 billion expected in 2019 (revised downward from a $28 billion forecast in June). The net profit margin is forecast at 3.4% (up from 3.1% for 2019). The return on invested capital is forecast to be 6.0% (improved from 5.7% expected in 2019). Overall industry revenues are forecast to reach $872 billion (+4.0% on $838 billion in 2019). Alexandre de Juniac, IATA’s Director General and CEO, said,  “Slowing economic growth, trade wars, geopolitical tensions and social unrest, plus continuing uncertainty over Brexit all came together to create a tougher than anticipated business environment for airlines. Yet the industry managed to achieve a decade in the black, as restructuring and cost-cutting continued to pay dividends. It appears that 2019 will be the bottom of the current economic cycle and the forecast for 2020 is somewhat brighter. The big question for 2020 is how capacity will develop, particularly when, as expected, the grounded 737 MAX aircraft return to service and delayed deliveries arrive.”

The overall cancellation rate of scheduled domestic airlines for the month of November 2019 has been 1.87%. AirAsia India recorded least number of cancellations and recorded 0.51% cancellations, followed by Vistara at 0.63% and Indigo at 1.07%. SpiceJet stood at 4th place with 1.51% cancellations and Star Air was fifth at 2.08%. GoAir was at 2.10%, while Air India recorded 3.68% cancellations.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) is in talks with the Indian civil aviation officials to adopt the worldwide airport slot guidelines which will help new airlines get slots at various airports in India. Once adopted, more international airlines will be able to fly into India, connecting more cities worldwide and it could also help the UDAN scheme. As per the guidelines, new entrants which could either be new airlines or those who have not operated from a particular airport will be allowed three daily return flights. Once these slots are used up, that particular airline will not be allocated new slots but will have to bid for the next phase of expansion. (Source: The Hindu Business Line)

The government has said that it has invested over Rs 300 crore for developing airport infrastructure till November this fiscal. In an official statement, the Ministry of Civil Aviation said that as many as 10 airports commenced operations in 2019, 335 routes have been awarded, covering 33 aerodromes during the year. According to the ministry, approximately 3.4 million passengers flew under the government’s regional connectivity scheme, Udan, till date, with 134 routes commencing operations between January and October. “Rs 304.49 crore has been spent on up-gradation of existing and new airports from April to November this year. “Also, 10 airports became operational till December 7 in 2019, of which four are underserved (Lilabari, Belgaum, Pantnagar and Durgapur) and the remaining ones unserved (Kullu, Kalaburgi, Kannar, Dimapur, Hindon and Pithoragarh),” the release said.