Budget flyers lift October business for airlines

Over seven lakh more people took to the sky in October compared with September as India scripted its economic growth story, business travellers spend more on air travel and budget travel took off in a big way.
Data released by the Ministry of Civil Aviation on Monday revealed domestic air travel surged over 18% last month as local airlines flew 46.17 lakh passengers compared with 39.11 lakh in September.
Ankur Bhatia, managing director of Amadeus, said the jump in the number of airline passengers was mainly due to better economic fundamentals, which has put more money in the hands of people.
He also said since the base of air travel was still very low in India, even a small increase led to a high growth.
Bhatia said October’s growth was not backed with a proportionate spike in the airlines yields— net revenue per seat— as airlines chased volume growth by going after higher load factor.
The climb in air passenger number over the last 10 months—- between January and October— was equally robust. It grew 18.3% to 419.34 lakh this year from 354.55 lakh during the same period last year.
In terms of market share, full service carriers (FSCs) saw their pie shrink even as budget carriers expanded theirs.
23/11/10 Suparna Goswami/Daily News & Analysis

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Categories: Low Cost General Nov 2010