Tag Archives: SpiceJet

Ajay Singh, Chairman, SpiceJet, has confirmed that the airline will not bid for any stake in the process of privatisation of Air India. Speaking at the recently-concluded CAPA India Aviation Summit 2018 in Mumbai, he said, “We are just too small to bid for Air India. We may not be the appropriate candidate for this. Vistara and Singapore Airlines will probably do it. Conceptually, we are too small for this. Nevertheless, it’s a great asset and a fantastic brand.” Speaking about government’s move to privatise the national airline, Singh added, “The government has taken an appropriate decision and the reason for that is not lack of performance. I think we had some really great managers at Air India. Problem is the government system itself. If Air India is required to take every decision through a tender process, it is almost impossible to function. Either you need to allow them to run like a private operator or sell it to a private operator. .” He also confirmed that SpiceJet will expand its international routes albeit without mentioning any destinations. CAPA acknowledged his effort in turning around the airline over the last 32 months.

The Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) has given a nod to 90 proposals for 325 routes during the second round of bidding in the UDAN regional connectivity scheme. While SpiceJet and Air India subsidiary-Alliance Air have been a part of the scheme from the first round itself, IndiGo and Jet Airways participated in the second round only. R N Choubey, Secretary, Civil Aviation, said, “In all, we got 141 proposals for 502 routes (for both planes and choppers). Out of 325, 129 routes are in a newly created category of ‘priority areas’ that include Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal, Uttarakhand, North East, Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep Islands.” IndiGo has got 20 routes Kannur-Bangalore; Kannur-Trivandrum; Cochin-Hubli-Goa; Bangalore-Allahabad-Pune; Nagpur-Bhubaneswar-Allahabad; Mumbai-Allahabad; Hindon-Allahabad-Dehradun; Hindon-Gorakhpur-Allahabad and Hindon-Jaisalamer-Udaipur. SpiceJet was awarded 20 new sectors. “Out of these 20, 15 will cater to unserved markets of Kannur (Kerala), Darbhanga (Bihar), Ozar (Nashik), Pakyong (Sikkim), Kishangarh (Rajasthan).” Alliance Air has got 18 routes like Nashik-Ahmedabad-Kandla; Hyderabad-Kohlapur; Hubli-Hyderabad; Bikaner-Jaipur and Jammu-Bhatinda. Jet has got four proposals.  

Passengers carried by domestic airlines during January-October, 2017, were 954.45 lakhs as against 813.70 lakhs during the corresponding period of previous year, thereby registering a growth of 17.30 per cent. In Oct, SpiceJet continued to lead passenger load factors at 93.7 per cent, closely followed by GoAir at 87.6 per cent and IndiGo at 87.3 per cent. Air Asia came close at  83 per cent while, Jet Airways and Vistara recorded 80.5 and 80.2 per cent, respectively. The passenger load factor in the month of October 2017 has shown slightly increasing trend compared to previous month primarily due to the onset of tourist season. During October 2017, a total of 656 passenger related complaints had been received by the scheduled domestic airlines. The number of complaints per 10,000 passengers carried for the month of Oct 2017 has been around 0.63.

According to data released by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), India’s domestic air traffic registered a growth of 16.43 per cent in September as compared to the same period last year. The Passengers carried by domestic airlines during January to September 2017 were 849.94 lakhs as against 726.98 lakhs during the corresponding period of previous year thereby registering a growth of 16.91 per cent.  IndiGo carried the highest number of passengers, 3.6 million which was a 38.3 per cent share of the entire domestic aviation market. It was followed by Jet Airways with 1.4 million passengers and SpiceJet with 1.3 million. SpiceJet recorded the highest passenger load factor (PLF) or seat utilisation for the month of September at 94.2 per cent, followed by GoAir at 88.5 per cent and IndiGo at 85.2 per cent, Vistara at 84.1 per cent, Jet Lite at 83.3 per cent, Jet Airways at 80.2 per cent, Air India at 78.6 per cent, TruJet at 74.4 per cent and ZoomAir at 60.1 per cent.  SpiceJet reportedly commented, “This is the 31st month-in-a-row that SpiceJet has flown with load factors in excess of 90 per cent.” However, as compared to the previous months, the passenger load factor in September has shown a declining trend due to the end of tourist season, says the report by DGCA. In terms of on-time performance, IndiGo is at the top with 89.8 per cent of its flights arriving and departing as per schedule. Source: DGCA & inputs fro Business Standard

Cleartrip and SpiceJet have announced a partnership with Google Flights. This enables consumers to view flight schedules and fares right within the Google Flight search page. Speaking on the partnership, Ajay Singh, CMD, SpiceJet, said, “Google Flights is an innovative offering that makes travel planning fun and intuitive. At SpiceJet, our endeavour has always been to provide the highest value to our customers, and this partnership enables us to provide more options to India’s rapidly growing air travellers.” Balu Ramachandran, Head of Air and Distribution, Cleartrip, said, “Customers love Cleartrip for its products, and we have been working hard for the last few years to dramatically alter the reach, as we are confident that the product will take care of conversion and retention. We are excited about this partnership to bring Cleartrip in front of contextual travel customers, furthering our objectives of reach and efficiency.” Once users are on Google Flights, they can easily conduct search for different flight routings, using an interactive map to explore possible destinations and view live ticket prices. After selecting the flights they want, users can click the “Book” button to proceed to the Cleartrip or SpiceJet websites to purchase their tickets without having to fill in their flight choices again. Vikas Agnihotri, Industry Director, Google India, said, “India’s online travel sector is incredibly vibrant and has seen extensive growth and innovation. According to a report by Boston Consulting Group (BCG), the Indian travel market is projected to grow to $48 billion by 2020 with the biggest contributor, air travel expected to grow at 15% to $30 billion. For Google, a new entrant in the highly competitive online travel sector in India, this partnership with Cleartrip …

SpiceJet has announced its third daily direct flight on the UDAN routes of Hyderabad-Puducherry, starting August 16, 2017. After the new flight, Puducherry will be connected with Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Chennai, Tirupati, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Chandigarh, Vijaywada and Varanasi with convenient onward connections. SpiceJet was awarded six proposals and 11 routes in the first phase of Ministry of Civil Aviation’s UDAN scheme. Out of the six finalised proposals, four will cater to the unserved markets of Adampur, Kandla, Puducherry and Jaisalmer, and the other two will be for the underserved markets of Porbandar and Kanpur. Flights have already started on Mumbai-Porbandar-Mumbai and Mumbai-Kandla-Mumbai routes from July 10.

SpiceJet is all set to launch a new service between Delhi and Patna from July 10, which would take the number of flights from Patna to the national capital to 19 daily. On the other hand, Jet Airways will withdraw its morning connection between Patna and Delhi from July 15. Starting July 1, SpiceJet will be connecting seven new destinations to Patna, including Chennai, Hyderabad and Surat, which are new connections for SpiceJet. Kolkata, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Delhi are the other four destinations.

Passengers carried by domestic airlines during January to May this year were 465.87 lakhs as against 396.04 lakhs during the corresponding period of the previous year, thereby registering a growth of 17.63 per cent. This was revealed by Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) after analysing the traffic data submitted by various domestic airlines in May 2017. SpiceJet recorded the highest Passenger Load Factor (PLF) of 94.3 per cent, while IndiGo came out the winner in terms of On Time Performance (OTP) at 85 per cent.

SpiceJet has announced its e-commerce venture SpiceStyle, which would reportedly help in increasing the airline’s ancillary revenue. This would be SpiceJet’s entry into the retail segment, and the airline has announced that the portal is expected to rake in additional revenues worth Rs 150 crore in the first year. According to a statement by the airline, “The new venture will further boost SpiceJet’s ancillary revenue income which has grown from 6 per cent to around 17 per cent in the last two years.” Initially planned as an in-flight service, SpiceStyle is a wholly-owned subsidiary of SpiceJet and an e-commerce portal ‘www.spicestyle.com’ has been set up in this regard. Besides, it has tied up with Amazon to launch an all new brand store. The strategic alliance would offer SpiceStyle’s entire portfolio of brands on the shopping portal at launch prices offering 25 per cent discount.

SpiceJet has started its daily direct flight service from Goa to Surat. This will be the first ever direct connection between Goa and Surat by any airline. As the first nonstop flight between Goa and Surat, the new flight will provide travellers with a convenient travel option, thus saving their time while making their journey hassle free. To cater to the peak summer rush, from March to October, SpiceJet has unleashed a whole new summer schedule wherein the airline has added 19 new domestic and 3 new international flights, thus offering more seats and connecting key metros and cities.