02 Jul 2018

India Aviation Industry Newsletter 2 July

Air connectivity between India, Israel set to increase Connectivity between India and Israel is all set to increase, with air fares set to fall. Air India is increasing its frequency of flights to Tel Aviv and an Israeli airline is planning to put Delhi on its network. At present Air India and El AL have direct flights between the two countries. Israel Tourism had recently said tourists from India in last three years have been rising and 2017 was best year so far with close to 60,000 visitors. Israel Tourism is targeting to get 1 lakh visitors from India this year. Australia and India sign open skies agreement Australia and India have liberalised their air services agreement, allowing airlines to operate unlimited services between the two countries. The unlimited services will be between the six largest cities in India and Australia, which were previously limited to only 6,500 seats per week to and from Mumbai, New Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad and Bengaluru. IndiGo appoints new Chief Commercial Officer Sanjay Kumar, Chief Commercial Officer of IndiGo, has resigned from the airline, with effect from 15th July 2018, to pursue other career interests. Rahul Bhatia, Interim CEO of IndiGo, said “I would like to thank Sanjay for all he has done for the Company in making IndiGo the airline it is. We are successful at what we do and Sanjay’s contribution has been very significant in getting us to the level we are today. I am grateful for all his hard work since he joined in January 2007 and wish him all the best in his future endeavours.” William Boulter, currently Chief Strategy Officer, will be taking over from Sanjay Kumar as Chief Commercial Officer. KLM registers 90 per cent load on flights from India: CEO Pieter Elbers KLM has given the Indian market a high priority in global operations as the airline has been registering 90 per cent occupancy on its flights out of Mumbai and Delhi, said KLM's President and CEO Pieter Elbers Noting that India was "traditionally a market which has relatively high load factors", he said, "our average load factor (from India market) is 90 per cent. So, in our network, (the place of) India is placed high". SpiceJet to take delivery of first two Boeing 737-800BCF in July 2018 SpiceJet to launch dedicated freighter operations in mid July 2018, when its first two Boeing 737-800BCF aircraft are delivered, following conversion at facilities in Shanghai and Israel. SpiceJet plans to begin operations flying between the metro cities, and later to international destinations. The airline plans to reach a fleet of 20 freighters by 2022. Acumen Aviation © 2 July All Rights Reserved.