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karatecatman · Guest

www.livemint.com/2009/09/22183929/Air-India-Star-Alliance-held.html?h=B
Air India, Star Alliance held talks on integrating network

Efforts were being made to align the processes and systems of the Indian Airlines and Air India, and bring them on par with the Star Alliance standards
PTI New Delhi:

The top management of Air India and the Star Alliance held discussions here on Tuesday as the national carrier presented its progress report on integrating its domestic and international network, including the work on evolving a common flight code.
Air India CMD Arvind Jadhav held talks with a six-member Star Alliance delegation here and briefed them about the work being done on integrating the two erstwhile carriers, Air India and Indian Airlines, their fleet and network strength and of integrating their IT systems, official sources said.
One of the biggest obstacles for Air India in becoming a part of Star Alliance is the absence of same flight-code, which is IC for Indian Airlines and AI for Air India.
A common IT system, on which a US company was working, is likely to be finalized soon, the sources said, adding, eventual integration would take another six months.
Efforts were being made to align the processes and systems of the two erstwhile airlines and bring them on par with the Star Alliance standards, the sources said.
The Star Alliance is a global alliance of over two dozen airlines, which code-share flights, provide seamless transfers to passengers within their network and cooperate among each other on engineering, IT, infrastructural and other issues.
Air India was in the process of integrating the activities that cover product delivery, passenger handling and sales and marketing functions. The activities include reservations and ticketing, pre and post flight processes and frequent flyer programme among others.

karatecatman · Guest

In the name of turnaround, AI mgt slashing pay: union

Press Trust of India
Mumbai
September 22, 2009

A section of Air India employees' union today alleged that the air-carrier's management was slashing their wages in the name of a turnaround plan.

"The entire focus of the management has now narrowed down to slashing employees wages in the name of a turnaround plan," All India Aircraft Engineers Association's General Secretary Y V Raju told reporters here. Air India employees are not responsible for its mounting losses, he said.

Employees have been getting their salaries late for the last three months (June, July and August) and "there was a simmering discontent among the employees about the late-payment of wages", Raju said.

State-owned Air India has over 31,700 employees, 1,500 pilots and 670 engineers and is in deep financial trouble.

The Association alleged that the management has been blaming the employees for the present crisis but "we have no role in the day-to-day functioning or decision-making and framing management policies in running the airline."

"We appeal to the public, who are the actual owners of this company to take up our cause in saving Air India and we want to clear all misconceptions about the employees being responsible for this mess," Raju said.

Uncontrolled and unregulated expansion of Indian aviation without infrastructure has led to over-capacity and adversely affected the industry at large, he alleged.

xterra · Member Joined: 10 Feb 2007 Posts: 595 Location: DONT KNO

another single bogie 320 has been returned to the lessor

http://www.flightglobal.com/airspace/photos/goose/indian-airlines-a320-231-vt-eyf-landing-kemble-35889.aspx
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~~~Indian Aviation Photographers~~~

karatecatman · Guest

Austerity drive: No caviar, or costly biscuits on Air India One

Naveen Kapoor
Onboard Air India One, Sep.23
ANI:
With austerity being the buzz word in Indian corridors of power, it seems, that every area of government-public interaction is being hit by the bug.

News is already out that the Prime Minister's delegation has been pruned for his Group of Twenty trip to Pittsburgh via Frankfurt in Germany.

That, it seems, is not enough! Staff on Air India One, the Prime Minister's official aircraft, were reportedly given advance instructions to trim the contents on offer in the official menu.

Following the order to a tee, the staff did not serve expensive biscuits and eliminated caviar, but in a concession to the media accompanying the delegation, served all those on board the choicest of liquor en route to Frankfurt, where there will be an overnight halt.

The gifts for all on board have also been cut. Earlier it used to be small but expensive electronic items, booze, Parker pens and the like.

Jaysit · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 4346

Pratibha Patil is a vegetarian, and doesn't eat caviar.

Apparently her favorite food is uttapam.

The only people dining on caviar would be the press and/or the crew.

Keep the stuff for full fare paying passengers in First Class.

avbuff · Member Joined: 22 Dec 2006 Posts: 5031

iah87 · Member Joined: 17 Apr 2007 Posts: 2566

karatecatman · Guest

www.livemint.com/2009/09/23220854/Nacil-not-to-restructure-deal.html?h=B
Nacil not to restructure deal with Airbus, will stick to original plan

Air India is expecting a bailout from the government to the tune of Rs15,000 crore and has committed to overhaul its operations and restructure debt of Rs15,241 crore

K. Raghu and P.R. Sanjai Bangalore/Mumbai:
State-owned carrier National Aviation Co. of India Ltd, or Nacil, which operates flag carrier Air India, has dumped its plan to restructure a deal to buy Airbus A320 planes from European plane maker Airbus SAS, and will stick to its original plan of inducting 15 planes by the end of 2010.
“Air India had asked us for a plan for restructuring. We presented (the proposal). But they decided on the initial plan,” Kiran Rao, executive vice-president for sales and marketing at Airbus, said in an interview on Wednesday.

An Air India spokesperson confirmed that his carrier was not cancelling or delaying the delivery of any Airbus planes.
State-run Air India is expecting a bailout from the government to the tune of Rs15,000 crore and has committed to overhaul its operations and restructure debt of Rs15,241 crore. Its accumulated loss through fiscal year 2009 was at least Rs7,200 crore.
As part of the effort to turn around the company and cut costs, Air India had held talks with aircraft manufacturers to lower their prices.
“The idea was to defer the deliveries of the planes. One of the suggestions was to cancel some of its orders. The talks are progressing to have optimized fleet, which will also reduce the financial burden. But nothing has been finalized yet,” said a person familiar with the airline’s turnaround plan.
In 2005, Air India had placed an order for 111 aircraft, 43 from Airbus and 68 from rival Boeing Co.
As part of the turnaround plan, Air India had proposed to launch a low-fare carrier with an all-economy-class configuration.
“All 320 will go as two class (or business and economy configuration) as of now,” Rao said. This decision indicates that Nacil’s plan for an all economy or budget class fleet could be delayed.
“We are now converting our older planes into all-economy class rather than new ones. We will (be) starting our low-fare and all-economy class services on the international routes starting from October,” an Air India spokesperson said.
“We have not taken a call on our low fare operations on the domestic routes,” he added.
Air India had been originally planning to start all economy services on the domestic routes by this month.
“Interestingly, the civil aviation market is showing some revival signs. So it makes sense not to cancel or delay the deliveries of planes. Because once you defer or cancel your planes, you will lose out an opportunity when the market is on upside,” said an airline expert who did not want to be named.
Some 25,000 new passenger and freighter aircraft valued at $3.1 trillion (Rs149 trillion) will be delivered from 2009 to 2028, according to Airbus’ latest Global Market Forecast released on 17 September.
Of this, around 10,000 planes would be replacements of existing aircraft globally. Nearly a third of the new demand would come from India and China.
India’s passenger market will grow the fastest at 10% a year over the next 20 years followed by China at 7.9%, Airbus said.

AirIndia0001 · Member Joined: 28 Sep 2007 Posts: 391

jasepl · Member Joined: 26 Jul 2008 Posts: 4257 Location: bund-bay

747-237 · Posted: Thu Sep 24, 2009 9:31 pm Post subject:

Phadnis · Posted: Thu Sep 24, 2009 10:15 pm Post subject:

VT-DNV is ex-Deccan (or Air Deccan or Simplifly Deccan, whatever they call it these days). Not a double-bogey A320.
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Aiel · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 927 Location: Bangalore

karatecatman · Guest

www.business-standard.com/india/news/ai-coo-to-be3-year-contract/371203/
AI COO to be on 3-year contract
BS Reporter
Pittsburgh
September 25, 2009

The COO of the state-owned National Aviation Company of India Limited (Nacil) will have an initial tenure of three years. The tenure can be extended by two years provided the incumbent’s performance is satisfactory.

The COO’s compensation package will be negotiable, based on qualification and experience in the industry. But he will also be given a performance-linked pay based on key performance indicators determined by the management or the board.

Nacil operates India’s only state-owned airline on both the domestic and international routes under the brand name of Air India. The government had recently decided that the loss-making company would appoint a COO, who will report to its chairman and managing director, Arvind Jhadav, who belongs to the Indian Administrative Services.

An advertisement, appearing in Financial Times, indicates that Nacil has gone in for a global search for its COO. The advertisement says Nacil’s gross annual turnover is $4 billion. The advertisement makes no reference to its current or accumulated losses.

The COO, according to the advertisement, will be on contract and part of the top management team at NACIL. The incumbent, it says, should have vast experience, be professionally qualified, highly motivated and result-oriented, with proven leadership qualities and a part of the top management team of any public/private sector company in India or abroad. Preference would be given to those candidates who are in the aviation industry or in the past had turned around performance of a large organisation with manpower strength of at least 10,000.

***
http://cricket.expressindia.com/news/Can-t-cancel-order-now--Boeing-to-AI/521369/
Can’t cancel order now: Boeing to AI
Smita Aggarwal
Sep 25, 2009

New Delhi: The loss-making Air India’s efforts to cancel the deliveries of six Boeing aircraft has run into rough weather as the aircraft company Boeing is showing reluctance to cancel the order.
Instead the aircraft company, which is negotiating the cancellation, has suggested that Air India take the delivery of these aircraft for the time being and said that later it will assist in leasing the same to other airlines. “Air India is in the process of negotiating the deal with Boeing for the cancellation of these six aircraft. While Air India is keen on cancelling the order, Boeing has put forward a proposal whereby it has insisted that the aircraft delivery be taken and they could be later given on a dry lease to other airlines,” a top government official, on the condition of anonymity, told The Indian Express.

These six aircraft are part of the acquisition of 111 aircraft, payments for which have added to the airline’s financial woes. In its board meeting held in July, the airline had decided to cancel the deliveries of the six aircraft.

Something not quite okay. Leasing scam lobby at work here.

747-237 · Posted: Fri Sep 25, 2009 11:52 pm Post subject:

747-237 · Posted: Sat Sep 26, 2009 9:04 am Post subject:

karatecatman · Guest

karatecatman · Guest

karatecatman · Guest

Rat elusive, Boeing-777 flown to Delhi for fumigation
Varinder Singh
Tribune News Service

Amritsar, September 28
Efforts by the Air India staff to locate in its Boeing-777 plane the rat that had led to an 11-hour delay in the airline’s Toronto-bound flight AI-187 on Saturday morning proved futile even on Monday, with the airline management finally moving the “rat-carrying” plane to New Delhi today where the aircraft would be subjected to thorough examination.

The plane had been parked at Rajasansi airport since Saturday after a rat was was spotted in the plane at 6.30 am by “luggage loaders”. The flight was cancelled and the aircraft parked aside.

Passengers were de-planed and moved on to another plane late on Saturday evening after more than 11 hours amidst allegations by passengers that they were not put up in a hotel during the prolonged “search rat”, as per norms.

Air India officials, led by Air India’s Rajasansi airport manager Ashwani Kumar Arora, tried to find the rat. The “search operation” was abandoned on Monday morning. Finally, Air India officials decided to take the plane to Delhi where its fumigation would be done to ferret out the rat and another rat in a cage placed inside the plane to check efficacy of fumigation. “If the rat in the cage dies, it would be presumed the rat inside the plane had also died. It is test to check efficiency of fumigation,” said an official.

Rajasansi airport director Chinson VS Pankal confirmed the plane had been moved to Delhi. He said the plane had left the Rajasansi airport sans passengers this morning. The plane was flown to Delhi by Capt Arvinder Singh.

avbuff · Member Joined: 22 Dec 2006 Posts: 5031

If they carry those maids, servants, dogs of the AI senior staff and politicians and the politicians themselves, why target the poor rat?

Jaysit · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 4346

Now that's a viable strategy. If the caged rat dies, then its certain that the other rat died too.

Of course, dead rat's like any of God's dead creatures stink.

I can just imagine the headlines "Air India 777 Makes Emergency Landing in [------] as passengers faint from Stench of Dead Vermin."

karatecatman · Guest

747-237 · Posted: Tue Sep 29, 2009 11:17 pm Post subject:

karatecatman · Guest

747-237 · Posted: Thu Oct 01, 2009 9:13 pm Post subject:

The latest AIX 737-800, VT-AYC has been delivered. This is the second - last 737 AIX will be receiving (24th of 25).

karatecatman · Guest

Unusual tail this time. Looks like some prehistoric design. Has animal-human figures on some kind of handicrafts background.

Aiel · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 927 Location: Bangalore

Looks like a sari pattern to me.
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karatecatman · Guest

Update

Air India will be dry leasing out the first three LRs "Andhra", "Arunachal" and "Assam" for upto 2 years. (One more LR may be added.)

and

the four A310 freighters for upto 1.5 years.
Rolling Eyes

Also, buzz is that Air India may take delivery of the last 6 777-300ERs and then immediately wet-lease them out. Boeing is offering to assist Air India do this. (Most of the AI management think that the 773s are an overkill and that AI should go in for outright cancellation.)

(Target airlines are Kenya and Ethiopian and a Gulf operator. Kenyan is looking to pick up a few leased A330s.)

karatecatman · Guest

www.dnaindia.com/money/report_air-india-may-retry-cuts-in-pli-by-mid-october_1294383
Air India may retry cuts in PLI by mid-October
Sindhu Bhattacharya, Yogesh Kumar & Baljeet Parmar
DNA
Friday, October 2, 2009
New Delhi/ Mumbai: The drama at Air India is far from over.

Even as the airline's management issued a fresh order on Wednesday evening, holding back performance linked incentive (PLI) cuts, it is expected to once again try and implement a cut by mid-October.

Official sources said on Thursday that the management and civil aviation ministry are discussing implementation of a steep 50% reduction in PLI for all employees and a decision could be taken on October 15.

Thus, the salary for October for all Air India employees may come with only half the incentives.

"The cut has to be done. It is absolutely essential, but when and by how much is being worked out. We have constituted a committee. It will talk to all sections of employees before making its recommendations to the board," a senior ministry official told DNA.
The issue of incentive cuts, which paralysed the airline for four days, is unlikely to die down in a hurry as on it hinges the very survival of AI.

Sources said unless the cuts are implemented, the airline cannot go to the government with its demand for equity infusion.

In Mumbai, nearly 200 executive pilots demanded that 160 expatriates working with AI and Air India Express on contract basis should be sacked, as they cost the airline over Rs150 crore annually.

According to an SMS sent to the prime minister's office, the pilots termed the management's decision to cut their salary as ridiculous.

Pilots claimed the expatriates, who work for 20 days a month, get a fixed salary of $13,000 (Rs6.5 lakh) per month. Apart from that the airline has to bear the cost of transportation, accommodation in five-star hotels and a return ticket to their country of origin every 20 days.

***

Air India tinkers with operational costs to save money
Ramiya Bhas
DNA
Friday, October 2, 2009
Mumbai: Pilots may have hijacked Air India's plans to reduce staff costs by snipping their productivity-linked incentives (PLI) by up to 50%, but the state-owned carrier is continuing attempts to become leaner and meaner.

For example, the flag carrier has scrapped foreign travel privilege for its employees, so those seats are now generating revenues.

A senior AI executive, who did not want to be named, said the airline has also called back four executive directors who had been deputed to other countries, as part of the airline's cost saving measures.

"The management has decided that it would cut down on corporate foreign travel of its employees, especially at the executive level, indefinitely. These seats are now being utilised for the paid passengers," the AI executive said.

He added that while the airline may not be able to do much on the fuel and employee costs, over 50% of operational expenditure can easily be tinkered with. That is where the airline is focusing its energy on.

It is aggressively renegotiating ground-handling contracts when they come up for renewal, taking advantage of its scale of operations -- having been merged with Indian Airlines -- to bargain for better deals and steep discounts.

AI is looking to save Rs 200 crore per month on passenger amenities, ground handling, consumables, etc. It plans to save Rs 100 crore a month on fuel costs by optimising aircraft utilisation.

"Optimisation of our fleet utilisation will lead to better fuel consumption and save up to Rs 100 crore per month," said the official.

To improve cash flow, the carrier is in the process of converting 10 twin-class Airbus 320s into single class -- all-economy -- aircraft for medium-haul international destinations. The converted aircrafts will be inducted into the fleet from October 25. when Air India launches its winter schedule.

"Some of these A320s were inducted in our fleet in the early 90s. We are in the process of modifying them for our new routes on the international segment of Air India Express,"' said the official.

He said the aircraft will have 168 economy seats in all after the 20 business-class seats are removed. The cost incurred on conversion of the aircraft will be marginal.

747-237 · Posted: Fri Oct 02, 2009 3:14 pm Post subject:

karatecatman · Guest

747-237 · Posted: Fri Oct 02, 2009 6:01 pm Post subject:

Phadnis · Posted: Fri Oct 02, 2009 7:14 pm Post subject:

Jaysit · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 4346

If Air India can't even fill up 77Ls, let alone 77Ws (the two most efficient aircraft around) or 744s to its primary long haul destinations, it should just get out of the biz and become an Indian version of Olympic or MALEV, serving only regional markets.

A fleet of 23 77Ls and 77Ws for an airline like Air India is not that large. But the airline has no vision.

Unfortunately, routes that used to be served with large widebodied airliners like Dubai and Singapore are now being served by the A320 family.

And cities all over the world are being served from India by EK and the like.

nadarji · Member Joined: 11 Jan 2007 Posts: 305

The one opportunity that AI seems to be missing is the advantages that a integrated terminal in DEL offers their carrier. If they concentrate their long distance routes from DEL with a integrated IC providing them feed, DEL could be to AI what DXB is to EK. DEL could actually be a better O&D for places like NYC, Toronto etc.

Except BOM-LHR and BOM-NYC, all other long distance destinations should move to DEL.

My suspicion is that the long range routes were never profitable for AI. They used the revenues from SE-Asia and Gulf routes to subsidize these. Now that all the unglamorous flying has gone to AIX, AI is hugely unprofitable.

BTW, anybody know how AIX is doing financially?

Jaysit · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 4346

iah87 · Member Joined: 17 Apr 2007 Posts: 2566

jasepl · Member Joined: 26 Jul 2008 Posts: 4257 Location: bund-bay

Air India's move north has been slowly going on for a while now, and AI is increasing a Dilly-focused airline. Even more so if you include Indian Airlines/Alliance.

The only non-stop mid- to long-haul destinations remaining from Bombay are Frankfurt, London, Nairobi and New York.

From Dilly, AI have: Frankfurt, London, New York, Paris, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Tokyo.

That might not seem much at first, but the difference is rather stark: approximately 24 such flights from BOM and 45 from DEL.

More than anything, I'd chalk this up to Jet's increasing dominance over international ops from Bombay.

(Of course, it's anyone's guess just how much Goyal paid Praful to ensure AI's retreat).
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