Air India is offering almost 1.1 million domestic seats during the month, compared with 1.7 million this time in 2019. The airline’s international capacity has also recovered to about 82% of pre-pandemic levels
Air India under its new owner, the Tata Group, has chalked out plans for expansion that includes opening of several new hubs across the country and increase its footprint on key long-haul markets, according to a report in www.routesonline.com. The carrier has two hubs now: the primary one at Delhi and a secondary hub at Mumbai.
It may be pointed out that Air India and subsidiary Air India Express (a low cost carrier) were bought by the Tata Group for almost $2.4 billion in January this year.
Air India’s General Manager of Commercial Strategy and Planning, Purnima Nerurkar, said that Air India was keen to open several new regional hubs across the country. Its ambition, she said while speaking at Routes Asia 2022 in Da Nang recently, was to become “the largest hub carrier in the region”. She also pointed out: “Air India has the strategy already in place where we have a hub at Delhi for all our long-haul and our short-haul markets,” she said. “This is expected to grow because, going forward, our management’s thought and vision is to … create several hubs in India, which would facilitate growth from each of the regions.”
Air India is the fifth largest player in India’s domestic market during June 2022, with a 7.6% capacity share of all departure seats. LCC IndiGo is the largest, commanding 55.4%, followed by Go First on 9.9%, SpiceJet on 9.2% and Vistara on 8.4%, according to data from OAG Schedules Analyser,.
Air India is offering almost 1.1 million domestic seats during the month, compared with 1.7 million this time in 2019. The airline’s international capacity has also recovered to about 82% of pre-pandemic levels.
“Air India wants to double capacity to Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Central CIS countries, in addition to boosting operations to Australia and markets in Southeast Asia and Far East Asia.”
— Jinesh Papdiwal, Senior Manager
Nerurkar also said: “We have a lot of important points in India, which are the source markets for a lot of our long-haul markets. So, it’s important that we capture this traffic, and we give this traffic the right support that it requires and facilitate the growth within India. So, where there is a requirement for hub, we are looking at multiple hubs in India.” The General Manage also mentioned that the carrier, since the takeover by the Tata Group, had seen “huge transformations” in the way the business operates, which includes reassessing its network strategy and partnerships with other carriers.
According to Senior Manager Jinesh Papdiwal, Air India serves 50 domestic destinations but wants to increase the number to 200. Through codeshares and partnerships, the airline also serves 75 international destinations, but hopes to grow to more than 125 points. Speaking at Routes Asia, Papdiwal said: “We have seen the Indian market being catered to by one-stop product for a long time now. It is time with the new management and the new vision to take back the market to direct offerings so that our customers have options and direct offerings to take them to their destinations…With that in mind, we’ve tried to think of what our core markets are and how do we grow there. North America is an important market for us, and we see in the next few years with our expansion plans, we will be tripling our capacity into North America.”
Papdiwal also said that Air India wanted to double capacity to Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Central CIS countries, in addition to boosting operations to Australia and markets in Southeast Asia and Far East Asia.
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