Airliners-India.com

karatecatman · Guest

Continued from Air India turnaround plan
http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/airlinersindia-ftopic7654.html

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

So apparently AI have managed to get an extension from Star.

Jadhav says they now have a December 2010 deadline:

http://www.financialexpress.com/news/Air-India-gets-extension-to-join-Star-Alliance/553106/

I'd bet money that AI won't be a Star member in December 2010. Ariana and Biman will be integrated into an alliance before AI.
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four years free of jetya punti!

Nimish

iah87 · Member Joined: 17 Apr 2007 Posts: 2566

Spiderguy252 · Posted: Mon Dec 14, 2009 8:18 pm Post subject:

The ideal situation would be:

1. Air India- Star Alliance
2. Jet Airways- Oneworld
3. Kingfisher Airlines- Skyteam

Air India doesn't look like it's going to happen, ever. Though you only keep hearing news about AI! What's up with 9W and IT? Don't they want to join an alliance at all?
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Yeah.

me111993 · Member Joined: 04 Sep 2009 Posts: 3225 Location: MAA/AMD

What is the basic criteria for joining an alliance of the quality of SA or OW? Do these alliances approach airilnes or is it the other way round??

Once AI joins SA, some improvement is definate and it will trigger a trend which would be followed by the likes of 9w and IT.

iah87 · Member Joined: 17 Apr 2007 Posts: 2566

Flying low, AI lost cash on 7 of every 10 flights in ’09
New Delhi:

At least seven out of ten flights that the beleaguered state-owned carrier National Aviation Company of India Limited (NACIL) operated from April to October 2009 made cash losses, as per figures released by the civil aviation ministry. The carrier has accumulated losses up to Rs 7,200 crore as of March 2009 and is awaiting government bailout to come out of the red. During this period, the carrier operated 192 flights, of which 133 made cash losses and only 59 were able to achieve operation break even, according to the provisional figures provided by civil aviation minister Praful Patel in the Lok Sabha on Thursday. On these loss-making routes — accounting for almost 60-65 per cent of total routes operated by the carrier — Air India lost Rs 1,924 crore in 2007-08.

In 2008-09, these shot up to Rs 3,214 crore as loss-making routes accounted for 70-75 per cent of total routes. For the period April to October 2009, these routes resulted in losses of Rs 1,522 crore. This figure may come down as compared with the previous year as load factors have improved considerably, said a senior ministry official. The Delhi-New York and Mumbai-New York route figures on the list of loss-making routes, official added. Having embarked on a turnaround plan, the carrier will be undertaking route rationalisation and fleet rationalisation. The carrier will be trimming its fleet from 146 at present to 105 by March 2011, Patel informed the Lok Sabha. The fleet rationalisation will result in reduction of future requirement of pilots, cabin crew and engineers, Patel added. The airline, with employee to aircraft ratio of 203 employees per aircraft, has been trying to come out of the red by undertaking various cost-cutting measures including wage restructuring. Some of the other international airlines that have high employees to aircraft ratio include Air France (408:1), Thai Airways (306:1) and Lufthansa (202:1).

18/12/09 Indian Express

According to this article on 59 of 192 flights broke even. Remaining made losses. Guess none of the routes made profits.

Incredible !!! AI has a long long way to go to even to break even.

karatecatman · Guest

FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL
Air India to operate 787 to Asia and Europe
Ghim-Lay Yeo

Air India plans to operate the Boeing 787 Dreamliner to Asia and Europe, after it receives its first 787 in the second quarter of 2011.

It will replace its Airbus A310s with the new aircraft, says an Air India spokesman.

"We plan to operate the 787 to Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore and destinations in Europe," he adds.

Air India, which has 27 787-8s on order, will be the first Indian carrier and third airline to operate the 787, says the spokesman.

karatecatman · Guest

WALL STREET JOURNAL
Boeing to Deliver 787 Dreamliner to Air India in 2011

By ANIRBAN CHOWDHURY
MUMBAI -- Boeing Co. will deliver its first 787 Dreamliner in India during the second quarter of 2011, the U.S.-based aircraft maker's India president said Wednesday.

The aircraft will be delivered to state-run Air India, which has ordered 27 Dreamliners from the Seattle-based company, Dinesh Keskar said at a news conference.

Jet Airways (India) Ltd. -- with its order for 10 aircrafts--is the only other Indian airline to have ordered the Dreamliner.

Jaysit · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 4346

Devesh

Devesh · Posted: Mon Dec 21, 2009 3:08 am Post subject:

me111993 · Member Joined: 04 Sep 2009 Posts: 3225 Location: MAA/AMD

karatecatman · Guest

TIMES OF INDIA
‘Top priority is to get AI into Star Alliance’Saurabh Sinha
TNN
21 December 2009

FRANKFURT: German airline Lufthansa wants the Air India-Indian Airlines combine to speed up the merger and its entry into Star Alliance, a delay
that is directly benefitting the Gulf carriers. The lead airline for the alliance, Lufthansa, has said that while getting AI into Star is its “top priority”, a big country like India has room for more than one partner and that “Jet is also an option”.

Lufthansa’s board member Karl Ulrich Garnadt said this last week and added although the German airline understands that PSUs globally take longer than a private company for implementing big ticket decisions, “the wait can’t be indefinite”.

“We are waiting for the merger to come through so that we can code share with the massive domestic network of IA. We had hoped for better connectivity within India on IA through Delhi and Mumbai but a lot more needs to be done,” he said.

AI-IA combine chief Arvind Jadhav told TOI that the airline has time up to December 2010 to join Star and sounded confident of making it by then. “We should have the single code for AI and IA flights by October,” he said. A single code for AI and IC (code for IA flights) is a necessity for the carrier to join Star but this process has been delayed by over a year now.

Jet is learnt to have been trying to pip AI to the post in becoming the first Indian carrier to join a major alliance as this entails major benefits in terms of assured traffic. “India is one of the most important long haul markets for us and second only to US in terms of number of daily flights. Merger of IA- AI is a necessity for India to become a major player in global aviation,” the board member said.

(The correspondent was in Frankfurt at the invitation of Lufthansa & Fraport)

Jaysit · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 4346

Its going to take them over 10 months from now to enable all IC flights to have an AI code? Then what? Another 10 years to have a single web site, another 20 to enable a single reservations platform?

Morons. Star* should just dump this passel of fools and court Jet or even Kingfisher.

iah87 · Member Joined: 17 Apr 2007 Posts: 2566

According to Arvind Jadhav, AI/IC will be on a common code by Oct 2010. What about common reservations system ? I am sure they can do it within a few months.

A common reservations system is essential for AI to make it work to enter the Star Alliance and also for its own improvement in loads and yields.

Nimish · Posted: Mon Dec 21, 2009 9:56 pm Post subject:

Devesh · Posted: Tue Dec 22, 2009 5:37 am Post subject:

me111993 · Member Joined: 04 Sep 2009 Posts: 3225 Location: MAA/AMD

Arvind Jadhav is just as much at fault as the entire AI. It will be a collective failure of the entire organisation at a whole if AI is unable to join SA and a hand ful of people shouldnot be picked up and blamed for this loss of opportunity.
Frankly speaking, if the heads of SA have mentioned 9w's name as a probable member of SA then they have given a clear message to AI that they (SA) are ready with a much more organised and prepared alternative (9W) and if the Dec 2010 deadline is not met, they'll be happy to rope in 9w instead of the ever struggling AI.
9w inturn will benifit heaps from this. Most of their major international including SIN, BKK, LHR, BRU, EWR, YYZ are large SA hubs.
_________________
Causal Determinism : We are hardwired to need answers. The Caveman who heard a rustle in the bushes and checked out to see what it was, lived longer than the guy, who assumed it was just a breeze.

- Greg House

sammyk · Posted: Tue Dec 22, 2009 9:01 am Post subject:

Any CMD of Air India is just a puppet. Blaming him is pointless.

con spirito · Member Joined: 07 Apr 2007 Posts: 577 Location: Inflight

747-237 · Posted: Tue Dec 22, 2009 10:45 pm Post subject:

AIX's latest getting ready to come home.

Is it me, or do those hindi titles look a little small.

Aseem · Member Joined: 15 Dec 2006 Posts: 2841 Location: YYZ

Sweet!!

iflytb20 · Posted: Wed Dec 23, 2009 11:02 am Post subject:

Nimish · Posted: Wed Dec 23, 2009 11:28 am Post subject:

iflytb20 · Posted: Wed Dec 23, 2009 1:14 pm Post subject:

Optimus.Prime · Posted: Wed Dec 23, 2009 3:43 pm Post subject:

That 738 in that livery,

She's a looker......she sure is!
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Why can't Donuts be square?

Jaysit · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 4346

Apparently AI have suspended codeshares with SQ as of Jan 1, 2010.

What's that all about?

Nimish · Posted: Thu Dec 24, 2009 11:53 am Post subject:

karatecatman · Guest

6 AI Express flights cancelled
STAFF WRITER

Kozhikode, Dec 25 (PTI) Disruption of Air India Express service from here to Gulf destinations over the last few days has resulted in cancellation of at least six flights today.

Utter confusion prevailed at Karipur international airport here with the Air India Express cancelling flights to Manama, Abu Dhabi, two services each to Sharjah and Muscat while services to other Gulf destinations including Kuwait, Sharjah and Dubai were delayed indefinitely, airport sources said.

The AI Express, which operates several flights to the Gulf region, had recently withdrawn ground handling personnel of a firm after its contract expired without making alternate arrangements resulting in complete disruption of flight schedule over the last few days and cancellation of as many as six flights today to the Gulf sector, the sources said.

Besides, two senior airlines officials also reportedly went on leave, compounding the problem for Gulf-bound passengers.

karatecatman · Guest

A group of Democratic Youth Federation of India activists attacked the Air India office here today, protesting against disruption of Air India Express flights from Kozhikode, police said.
The pro-CPI(M) youth wing workers barged into the airline office at Mavoor Road here at around 1110 hours and smashed windowpanes before entering into an altercation with the staff for causing ‘‘inconvenience’’ to passengers due to disruption of flights to the busy Gulf sector.
Senior police officials rushed to the spot and brought the situation under control, the sources said.
At least six Air India Express flights from Karipur airport here were cancelled and over a dozen flights delayed indefinitely yesterday.
Airline staff were reportedly absent at the airport to brief passengers on flight schedules.
Air India had to cancel a few flight schedules while others were indefinitely delayed on various grounds during the week, inviting protests from passengers.
A passenger had yesterday accused Airline officials of going on leave during the Christmas recess, putting Gulf bound passengers to great hardship.

***

AI's response is that foreign commanders are on X'Mas leave which is what has led to the disruptions. Passengers contend that AI would have known in advance.

karatecatman · Guest

In response to an RTI application, NACIL had said it paid Rs 93.29 crore towards salaries and expenses to the agencies which provided expatriate pilots to Air India and Air India Express in the last fiscal. Of this, Air India paid Rs 46.63 crore (USD 93, 27,644.23) and Air India Express spent Rs 46.66 crore (USD 93, 33,732.11) on expatriate pilots. The expatriate pilots are paid through approved agencies which are given a monthly fee. Air India hires its expatriate’s pilots from global hiring agencies like Rishworth and Sigmar.

As per the reply to the RTI application, NACIL said a Boeing-737 commanding pilot is paid USD 10,000 while a B-777 commanding pilot USD 12,700, a B-747 and Airbus A-310 commander pilot USD 8,750 as salary. They also get a yearly bonus of USD 12, 000, USD 13, 000 and USD 15,000 on completion of one, two and three/four years in service respectively.

In addition, the company spends up to Rs 7,500 per day to accommodate foreign pilots in hotels and provide chauffeur-driven air conditioned cars for non-flying duties as well. With total staff strength of 30,505, the airline is targeting to lower its total manpower costs from Rs 839 crore in the first two quarters of the current financial year to Rs 650 crore in the next two quarters.

Air India alone has around 153 pilots, besides 1,253 Indian pilots and about 200 trainees.

There are around 810 expatriate pilots employed by five airlines--Air India, Jet Airways, Kingfisher Airlines, IndiGo and SpiceJet

747-237 · Posted: Sat Dec 26, 2009 10:16 pm Post subject:

The following aircraft have joined the fleet :
Airbus A319 VT-SCW 22 Dec 09
Airbus A321 VT-PPV 23 Dec 09

747-237 · Posted: Sun Dec 27, 2009 4:17 pm Post subject:

Here's a look at both sides of AYD's tail.

rutvij · Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 11:01 am Post subject:

Bloomberg UTV reports AI has shortlisted 4 Candidates for the post of COO. One of them is rumoured to be Wolfgang Mayrhuber, the current Lufthansa CEO. It also reports that the new CEO should be appointed by Jan End.

con spirito · Member Joined: 07 Apr 2007 Posts: 577 Location: Inflight

Broke Air India ready to pay crores to McKinsey

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/transportation/airlines-/-aviation/Broke-Air-India-ready-to-pay-crores-to-McKinsey/articleshow/5418372.cms

New Delhi: Cash-strapped Air India may be flying low these days, but the national carrier has a raft of consultants on a high as the airline management seeks expensive suggestions, which it often finds hard to implement.
This Friday, the national carrier’s board will consider a proposal to appoint McKinsey & Co as advisor to suggest ways to recover. An airline official, requesting anonymity, said the consultancy was demanding Rs 14 crore as fee for its services, mostly aimed at improving operations and joining the global air synergy, the Star Alliance.
Air India is already being advised by Booz Allen and Accenture, the latter tasked with smooth adoption of the erstwhile Indian Airlines into the Air India structure. Friday’s board meet will also look into extending Accenture’s services. The national carrier, which is struggling to pay staff salaries, doles out about Rs 25 lakh each month to Accenture, said the Air India official. Incidentally, the board members had themselves seen their performance-linked incentives being frozen as the carrier undertook a cost-cutting exercise.
Air India chairman and managing director Arvind Jadhav confirmed that the airline would place a proposal to hire the services of McKinsey before the board on Friday.
In July 2009, the company had appointed SBI Caps to suggest a road map for the financial restructuring of the airline in the short and medium term. Air India is looking at a complete transformation that includes revamp of customer interface process like reservation, airport handling, revenue management and frequent flyer programme, among others. It now plans to re-examine the choice of Frankfurt as its hub and launch of a low-cost airline in the domestic market, suggested earlier by its consultant.
07/01/10 Nirbhay Kumar/Economic times

Istead of paying crores to these MNC's which give ideas of which half of them are not feasible, AI should hire some of Airliners-India folks and see the change.
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India is one of the richest countries in the world.
The only problem is........all the wealth is distributed in the wrong hands.

me111993 · Member Joined: 04 Sep 2009 Posts: 3225 Location: MAA/AMD

Mumbai: National carrier Air India (AI), which is in the process of hiving off its engineering division into a separate subsidiary, on Wednesday said it has earned nearly $3,00,000 (Rs 1.46 crore) in December through its alliance with Dubai-based Aerostar Asset management company which provides engine repair management solutions mainly to the West Asia market. Although, this is a modest beginning, the carrier is pinning high hopes of generating as much as Rs 3,000 crore annually from its engineering facility which is four times more than it does currently. Currently, the public sector airline services approximately 100 planes annually.
Recently, AI's engine overhaul facility, and Aerostar Asset Management, Sharjah, UAE, created an engine MRO brand called 'The A Team.' Targeted at the Middle East market, this initiative will provide engine repair and management solutions to all airline operators of the region. Gradually, the venture aims to spread its wings to the Asia-Pacific, Europe and other key regions.
For AI, this venture is a smart business preposition since the passenger fleet in the Middle East region is expected to treble to 1,681 from the 586 passenger aircraft recorded at the beginning of 2009. The region is set to take delivery of 730 aircraft by 2018, with a further 689 on order up until 2028, as per the study done by European aircraft manufacturer Airbus.

me111993
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Causal Determinism : We are hardwired to need answers. The Caveman who heard a rustle in the bushes and checked out to see what it was, lived longer than the guy, who assumed it was just a breeze.

- Greg House

me111993 · Member Joined: 04 Sep 2009 Posts: 3225 Location: MAA/AMD

Apparantly there are no takers for the 6 Boeing 777's that AI had planned to lease out. An internal source was quoted saying "There have been many enquires but the deal price offered is way below than the current market price and quoted price."

Me111993
_________________
Causal Determinism : We are hardwired to need answers. The Caveman who heard a rustle in the bushes and checked out to see what it was, lived longer than the guy, who assumed it was just a breeze.

- Greg House

behramjee · Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2010 10:08 pm Post subject:

me111993 · Member Joined: 04 Sep 2009 Posts: 3225 Location: MAA/AMD