Ramki Sundaram makes the most of his short time as chief executive of India's Deccan

Ramki Sundaram's time in the chief executive chair may be coming to an end but he doesn't seem too worried about it.
Sundaram took over as chief executive of Indian low-cost carrier Deccan last May and will be stepping down when Deccan completes its planned merger with sister full-service carrier Kingfisher Airlines. The merger, expected to be completed over the next couple of months, will create one carrier with separate low-cost and full-service brands under a single air operators' certificate. It will also create one management team led by Vijay Mallya, the flamboyant chief executive and founder of Kingfisher Airlines who will be chairman and chief executive of the new entity. Sundaram says he hopes to stay on and be part of the new management team, pointing out that his promotion to chief executive one year ago "was driven by circumstances more than anything else".
Sundaram initially joined Bangalore-based Deccan in February 2007 as chief financial officer. He previously worked in London for South African banking group Investec and his knowledge of the airline industry was limited to his dealings in aircraft financing while at Investec. "I'm not from the industry as such so it was a steep learning curve," Sundaram says.
However, he had to learn the ins and outs of the industry quickly, in particular the peculiarities of the intensely competitive and dynamic Indian low-cost market. Less than four months after moving to Bangalore, a 26% stake in Deccan was sold to Kingfisher parent the UB Group. As part of the deal Deccan founder and chief executive G R Gopinath relinquished the chief executive role, although he remained chairman of Deccan's parent and will be vice-chairman of the new merged entity, and Sundaraman all of a sudden found himself in the chief executive seat.
Sundaram has since overseen an aggressive restructuring of Deccan's network and fare structure.
22/05/08 Brendan Sobie/Airline Business/Flight International

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Categories: Deccan May 2008