New Delhi: For Vistara, the full-service joint-venture airline of the Tatas and Singapore International Airlines (SIA), the world is going to be the stage, eventually. Even as the government is looking to scrap the 5-20 rule — domestic carriers need to wait for five years and must have 20 aircraft before they can fly abroad — the airline has made no secret of its desire to have international operations. There, however, is little clarity yet on strategy and the destinations it might fly to.
Vistara executives do not talk about it officially but informal discussions with those associated with the airline reveal there is a well-thought foreign plan; the blueprint will be known after the rules have been changed. The speed of implementation will depend on the final shape of the new policy.
If scrapping of the 5-20 rule and permission to fly abroad are subject to airlines mandatorily flying on certain specified regional or uneconomic routes, as is being considered by the government, it will be a dampener. But if the policy is more liberal, Vistara is clear where it wants to fly.
The strategy is also linked to the challenges SIA faces — from lack of enough seats to fly to India from Singapore, under the bilateral agreement, to challenges from West Asian airlines like Emirates and Etihad, wooing Indians to fly to the West and the US with them.
Sources say Vistara will surely want to fly directly from India to London, a market dominated by British Airways (BA) with a share of 42 per cent. According to sources, BA, Air India and Jet Airways together control over 90 per cent of the India-London direct flight market, while Emirates provides indirect connectivity. For instance, between Delhi and London, you have the choice of five indirect Emirates flights. But that is a crowded market and Vistara might instead want to take on Jet and Air India.
10/01/15 Surjeet Das Gupta/Business Standard
Vistara executives do not talk about it officially but informal discussions with those associated with the airline reveal there is a well-thought foreign plan; the blueprint will be known after the rules have been changed. The speed of implementation will depend on the final shape of the new policy.
If scrapping of the 5-20 rule and permission to fly abroad are subject to airlines mandatorily flying on certain specified regional or uneconomic routes, as is being considered by the government, it will be a dampener. But if the policy is more liberal, Vistara is clear where it wants to fly.
The strategy is also linked to the challenges SIA faces — from lack of enough seats to fly to India from Singapore, under the bilateral agreement, to challenges from West Asian airlines like Emirates and Etihad, wooing Indians to fly to the West and the US with them.
Sources say Vistara will surely want to fly directly from India to London, a market dominated by British Airways (BA) with a share of 42 per cent. According to sources, BA, Air India and Jet Airways together control over 90 per cent of the India-London direct flight market, while Emirates provides indirect connectivity. For instance, between Delhi and London, you have the choice of five indirect Emirates flights. But that is a crowded market and Vistara might instead want to take on Jet and Air India.
10/01/15 Surjeet Das Gupta/Business Standard
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