Category Archives: Aviation

British Airways has launched a Trade Graduate Programme that aims to recognise, motivate and reward travel agents for their commitment to the airline. The Trade Graduate Programme will equip the airline’s trade partners with the product knowledge and network information with respect to British Airways. The trade partners enrolled under the programme will be encouraged to complete nine incentivised training modules as part of the programme. Participants will get 15 days to complete each module. Moran Birger, British Airways’ regional general manager, South Asia said, “We, at British Airways value the relationship we share with our trusted travel trade partners as they play an instrumental role in providing excellent service to our customers in India. We have invested heavily in facilities including a call centre that provides round the clock assistance in order to build a long standing association with our trade partners. The Trade Graduate Programme is an extension of our efforts in supporting our partners in their endeavour to serve our customers better.” To make this exercise twice as much fun and beneficial for its valuable participants, British Airways is giving away exciting prizes in the form of Amazon and Croma shopping vouchers. With five winners per module, this programme is offering 45 travel trade partners the opportunity to win shopping vouchers. Additionally, participants who complete four, seven and all nine modules also get a chance to win shopping gift vouchers worth Rs. 5,000 to Rs. 20,000. The first module is on World Traveller Plus, British Airways’ premium economy product and will be available till 30th September. New modules will be available every fortnight and participants will be notified through the Speedbird Club Newsletter. Names of lucky winners …

IndiGo has entered a strategic partnership with Travelport which will see the airline distribute all of its fares and ancillary products to Travelport-connected customers worldwide. This is the first time that IndiGo has struck a deal with a global GDS. Through the strategic partnership with Travelport, IndiGo will place its fares, ancillary products and offers into the Travel Commerce Platform. The platform offers fully integrated, industry leading merchandising capabilities and is used extensively by travel agencies in India as well as other key target markets for IndiGo. This distribution platform, unique to Travelport, will enable IndiGo to provide its content via an API connection, rather than the more traditional fare filing methods often favoured by network carriers, and still have their fares and ancillaries displayed, compared and booked in exactly the same way. In addition, the airline will also use Travelport’s leading merchandising capabilities to bring IndiGo’s brand proposition to life for travellers arriving into India and then seeking domestic flights within the country. The distribution partnership will also help the airline reach travellers in international markets as it continues to expand its route network into destinations in the Indian Subcontinent, the Middle East and South East Asia. Commenting on the partnership, Aditya Ghosh, President & Whole Time Director, IndiGo said: “This arrangement with Travelport will allow us to reach new customers, both at home and overseas, in a cost effective manner without incurring the traditional costs associated with participating in global distribution platforms using old style industry mechanisms and instead, enabling our real time connectivity to the GDS platform via an XML API link.” Derek Sharp, Travelport’s Managing Director, Air Commerce, said, “It is a testament to our product leadership, …

Low-cost carrier AirAsia India announced the induction of an eighth aircraft and plans to take the fleet strength to 20 by the end of 2018. AirAsia India CEO Amar Abrol reportedly said that the airline will operate daily flights connecting Hyderabad and Kochi from October 8. It is offering limited promotional seats for all inclusive fares from Rs. 2,999 on this route. He said the airline hopes to complete the second round of funding by the month-end. However, he declined to give numbers but added that it would help the airline take its fleet strength to 20 aircraft by the end of 2018. All the aircraft will be A320s. (Source: IANS)

Effective October 12, GoAir will commence services from Hyderabad. The new schedule will introduce daily non-stop flights connecting Hyderabad to Chennai, Bengaluru, Bhubaneswar and Kolkata. Hyderabad will also be connected to Port Blair via Bangalore which will provide leisure travelers additional travel option. This latest addition to GoAir network reflects the airline’s phase of growth with a focus on scaling up operations gradually in the coming weeks while strengthening the value proposition to suit customer’s demand. With the new additions of aircraft in coming months, GoAir will operate up to 184 daily flights by the end of December from current 144 daily flights. Wolfgang Prock-Schauer, CEO, GoAir, said, “Hyderabad is a key market in South & Central India and a significant base for business and tourism in the region. Adding Hyderabad with its ideal geographical location, we reinforce our commitments towards connectivity across the country. It is our constant endeavor to provide flexibility of choice to our customers along with on time, convenient and affordable flying experience.”

India and Greece have signed an open skies agreement which will allow airlines from India to operate unlimited number of flights to Greece while Greek carriers have been granted unlimited traffic rights to six Indian metro cities which are Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Kolkata and Chennai. “Greece has become the first country to have an open sky agreement with India under the new policy,” said Rajiv Nayan Choubey, Secretary, Ministry of Civil Aviation, Government of India. At present, there are no direct flights between India and Greece and passengers travel one stop via Gulf states or Turkey to Greece. Prior to this, India had entered into an open skies agreement with the US and Britain. The open skies with Britain covers airports excluding London Heathrow. (Source: Business Standard)

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) and Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to enhance cooperation in various areas of airport operations, including security, passenger experience, cargo, airport development, consulting and training. The MoU was signed by Conrad Clifford, IATA’s Regional Vice President for Asia Pacific, and Hari Marar, BIAL’s President for Airport Operations, on the sidelines of an industry event in New Delhi. This MoU is the first of its kind that IATA has signed with an Indian airport. One of the highlights of the MoU could see IATA and BIAL implementing trials of new technologies and processes, and testing concepts at Bangalore International Airport. “This will place Bangalore International Airport in the forefront of airport operations. These trials will ensure that global best practice solutions can be appropriately adapted to the Indian environment, and will provide guidance for rolling out the implementation to other Indian airports,” said Clifford. The IATA Fast Travel initiative, Passenger Facilitation program and Smart Security are among the initiatives being considered as part of the MoU. “An important objective of the MoU is to promote the efficient development of civil aviation in India to meet growing demand. By 2035, India’s passenger traffic is forecast to exceed 400 million passengers, more than double that of today. The industry will support 19 million jobs and $172 billion of India’s GDP. But for this potential to become reality, India’s airports need to have the necessary infrastructure capacity while implementing efficient processes that embrace the latest technologies,” said Clifford.

India ranked 1st in offering the best value for international and domestic flights worldwide with an average flight cost of $3.25 per 100 kms of travel, factoring in both domestic and international journeys according to ‘The Aviation Price Index’, analysed by Kiwi.com. At the other end of the ranking, United Arab Emirates calculated at a cost over 30 times higher, at $105.71 per 100km of travel. Oliver Dlouhý, Chief Executive Officer, Kiwi.com, says, “We always aim to offer travellers the best possible deals, and hope this ranking informs them on the countries from which they can expect the most cost effective airfare, and assist them in booking the best value journey.” A million fights were analysed to find an average price of domestic and international flights on a low cost and a legacy airline from each of the countries. Domestic flights were calculated by averaging flight costs from the country’s capital to up to five major cities within the country (where available), or a major city in a neighbouring country where no domestic flights were available, whilst international costs were calculated from the capital of each country to up to five international hubs within the same continent. All flights were checked for the same dates of travel (or neighbouring dates where necessary) on- and off-season, taking into account the same destinations and travel scheduling.  China offered the least expensive international flights on both low cost and legacy airlines, at $1.22 and $2.84 respectively per 100km of travel; United Arab Emirates offered the most expensive domestic flights on both low cost and legacy airlines, at $181.38 and $202.36 respectively per 100km of travel; Canada offered the most expensive international flights on …

IndiGo will introduce new daily non-stop flights to Port Blair from Kolkata and Chennai effective September 28 and September 30, 2016, respectively. Port Blair will also be connected to Delhi (via Kolkata) and Hyderabad (via Chennai). The airline will also launch additional frequencies with daily non-stop flight between Delhi & Kolkata, Delhi & Chennai and Hyderabad & Varanasi sectors. The arrival fares for Kolkata-Port Blair flight is Rs 3499, Chennai-Port Blair flight is Rs 4499, Delhi-Port Blair flight is Rs 5999. Speaking on the launch of new flights and the addition of the new destination, Aditya Ghosh, President, IndiGo said, “We are extremely pleased about adding Port Blair as our 41st destination. It is going to be an important part of our destination network, catering to the needs of both business as well as leisure travellers, looking to embrace the deep blue waters. In addition, IndiGo will connect holy city of Varanasi with Hyderabad with daily non-stop service. Clearly, these are exciting times for the aviation industry and for us, as we are now in the 11th year of operation. We thank our flyers for their unflinching support in these past 10 years and we will continue to provide them an on time, hassle free and affordable flying experience.” On the international sector, IndiGo in August launched first daily non-stop flight between Chandigarh-Dubai and second daily non-stop on Kochi-Dubai sector. On the domestic front, IndiGo also recently introduced additional frequencies in Agartala – Kolkata sector, 1st non-stop flight on the Kolkata-Visakhapatnam-Kolkata sector and 5th daily non-stop flight between Kolkata and Hyderabad.

Dragonair has introduced the A320 Business and Economy class seats with new on-demand inflight entertainment system, StudioKA, from September 2, 2016. A comprehensive inflight entertainment system will be made available on Dragonair’s A320 fleet for the very first time in India, where each passenger can access their own choice of entertainment via the wireless IFE. The Business class passengers will be provided with tablets for IFE, whereas the Economy class passengers will be able to download the StudioKA app on their personal devices via the inflight Wi-Fi service. Moreover, Dragonair has also upped the comfort offered in-flight with the vision to truly enhance their passengers’ travel experience. Rajesh Menon, Regional Sales & Marketing Manager-South Asia, said, “We constantly strive to introduce services that can elevate the travel experience for our customers and make for a ‘Life Well Travelled’ experience. The east India market has seen a significant growth in the last few years. The new product suite onboard the A320 fleet, on all our flights from Kolkata is a great boost to this trend. The introduction of our new interactive Inflight Entertainment system, enhanced seats will usher in a combination of top notch entertainment, comfort and practicality. We are sure that our new enhancements will provide our valued customers with another reason to fly Dragonair.”

Scoot will commence its Jaipur–Singapore flight from October 2. Scoot has named its first plane landing in Jaipur ‘KamaScootra’ taking inspiration from the ancient Indian text. With this, India becomes the second country after Singapore to inspire an aircraft name after it for Scoot Airlines. The plane will have 335 seats, including 21 premium economy. There will be three flights every week from Jaipur to Singapore till October 29 and afterwards, the frequency will be increased to four. Bharath Mahadevan, Country Head, India, Scoot, says, “At this point, our focus in India is building guest awareness on our propositions – value, choices, innovation, and service with Scootitude–and getting them to experience why Scoot has been ranked Asia-Pacific’s top LCC for two years running. With Jaipur, we take another step towards the target of steadily increasing our operations in India.” The Singapore Airline Group will offer affordable fares from Jaipur to Singapore and other destinations like Melbourne, Sydney, Hong Kong and Bangkok. The fares will range from Rs. 4,699 onwards. The sale period starts on September 01 and ends on September 11, 2016.