AirAsia To Fly To Three New Routes In Southern India

Sepang: AirAsia, Asia's leading low cost airline, will fly to Kochi, Trivandrum and Kolkata come December, in a move to expand its network in Southern India.
AsiaAsia Group's Regional Head of Commercial Kathleen Tan said AirAsia was flying now to Tiruchirappalli and would spread its wings to other destinations in Southern India this year.
"For the fourth quarter and next year, AirAsia will focus on building our network in India where there is huge demand," she told Bernama in an interview on Monday in conjunction with AirAsia's 48-hour sales.
Elaborating on the Indian sector, Tan said AirAsia was looking at tapping destinations like Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and AirAsia's long-haul affiliate, AirAsia X, would look further at Mumbai and Delhi.
She said the Tiruchirappalli sector received overwhelming response from the population in Southern India who visited Kuala Lumpur and used it as a gateway to enter Southeast Asia.
Tan said the low cost carrier had opened up the flying experience as people not just travel for holidays but also for shopping or medical treatment.
She said AirAsia's low cost model also boosted domestic tourism as the airline's huge network enabled more Malaysians to take short domestic holidays to Kota Kinabalu, Kuching, Miri and Tawau.
28/09/09 Samantha Tan Chiew Ting/Bernama

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Low-fare airlines offer sops to attract fliers

Mumbai: With full-service airlines making inroads into the low-fare airspace, existing budget carriers are going beyond price advantage and handing out sops to attract and keep passengers.
These carriers are either giving away gifts or offering discounts at hotels, restaurants, and retail stores against boarding passes.
Low-fare carriers such as IndiGo (run by InterGlobe Aviation Pvt. Ltd), SpiceJet Ltd, GoAir (GoAirlines (India) Pvt. Ltd) and JetLite (India) Ltd, consider this the most effective way to counter loyalty programmes that are being offered by full-service rivals.
Jet Airways (India) Ltd, Kingfisher Airlines Ltd, National Aviation Co of India Ltd (which runs Air India) and Paramount Airways Ltd are full-service carriers and run loyalty programmes that offer flying miles based on how often a passenger uses the carrier.
India’s largest low-fare carrier IndiGo has announced a 20% saving on the prepaid in-flight meal if a passenger books tickets online. In the prepaid excess baggage option, too, the airline has offered a discount of up to 25% on luggage weighing between 10kg and 25kg.
Last week, SpiceJet launched its Privilege Pass Programme that allows travellers to avail special benefits from partner hotels against a used boarding pass. Benefits range from complimentary meals worth Rs1,500 or a discount of Rs500 on their total hotel billing. The partner includes Trident Hotels, Ista Hotels, Keys Hotels, Pride Hotels, Maidens Hotels, Rain Tree Hotels, JHM Interstate and The Park.
GoAir in early September ran an offer of gifts worth Rs3,000 on tickets sold through 20 September. The gift catalogue includes men’s watches and ties, and an oval pearl jewellery set for women.
JetLite, the low-fare unit of full service Jet Airways, is also offering discounts of up to 20% on car rentals with Avis and Hertz, dining, retail stores, and Lemon Tree and Marriott International hotels.
22/09/09 P.R. Sanjai/Livemint

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AI to convert 5 Airbuses into low-cost carriers

New Delhi: The National Aviation Company Ltd (Nacil), which runs state-owned Air India, is planning to convert five of its Airbus 320 planes into low-cost carriers under the Air India Express brand. The launches would be in the winter schedule and on 10 sectors.
A normal A320 has 124 economy class seats and 20 J-class seats. After the conversion, making it a full economy class plane, the number of seats increases to 168.
These converted aircraft, say sources, would fly on 10 sectors. These include flights to Sharjah from Hyderabad, Cochin, Trivandrum, Amritsar and Lucknow, Calicut-Dubai, Chennai-Kuala Lumpur, and Chennai-Colombo. An Air India spokesperson said the routes would be decided next week.
However, industry sources say Calicut-Dubai and Chennai-Colombo are routes where there is a demand for business class. Business class flyers account for 12 per cent of the revenue and many say the strategy to move more and more aircraft into a single configuration could have an adverse impact on the company’s total revenues from these flights.
A-I Express operates 193 weekly flights to 14 international destinations – Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi, Al Ain, Muscat, Salalah, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Bahrain, Doha, Kuwait, Colombo and Dhaka from 17 Indian cities.
22/09/09 Mihir Mishra/Business Standard

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High standards for low cost

New Delhi: India is gaining a global reputation as a talented producer of a range of low-cost goods from automobiles to machine tools. This is not just a case of leveraging a cost arbitrage on labour but also a product of value engineering and research which is, in turn, the result of an inherently resource-saving mindset.
The question is why this same outlook and expertise cannot be extended to the services sector — that is, services outside of information technology where the business is still largely driven by value arbitrage. The emergence of India’s low-cost or budget airlines suggests that it is eminently possible to do so.
Much is being made of the fact that the budget carriers are making the profits this year in contrast to their more lavish full-service counterparts because of the downturn. Collectively, they now have a 55 per cent market share, up from 45 per cent last year.
It could be argued that these gains were only to be expected in the downturn when cost-cutting is the mantra in vogue. But the bigger point to note is their overall service standards.
Ever since Jet Airways raised the bar on airline service standards when it started in 1993, air travellers in India have overcome the trauma of state-run Indian Airlines’ appalling service standards during its monopoly heyday. Most passengers now take efficient and friendly service for granted on full-service carriers. The fact that they also exist on budget carriers, however, is worth noting.
17/09/09 Kanika Datta/Business Standard

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India's budget airlines leave rivals in the cold

Mumbai: India's low-cost airlines are set to go from strength to strength as they grab market share from ailing premier carriers such as Air India, whose debts and losses continue to pile up, experts say.
Big airlines such as Jet Airways, Kingfisher and Air India are being hit by falling revenues due to tough economic conditions and high air fuel taxes.
The smaller, "no-frills" carriers such as Spicejet or Indigo, set up to open up the skies to the country's burgeoning middle classes, have dealt better with the turbulent business conditions of the last year, analysts say.
At least seven budget airlines fly across India's skies, with a 40-percent market share.
A sign of the predicament facing India's private airlines -- which carry 80 percent of local air traffic -- was seen last month when bosses threatened to ground planes for a day unless the government gave them a bailout.
The demand was denied but a strike was averted when the government promised to take steps to reduce the burden of steep fuel taxes.
Air India posted a 1.03-billion-dollar loss last financial year and has appealed for nearly 620 million dollars in state aid to keep flying.
03/09/09 Salil Panchal/AFP

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Tiger offers more than 50% increase in Chennai flights

Due to the overwhelming demand for its services,Tiger Airways will be offering savvy travellers increased flights to Chennai, India, starting 25 October 2009. In addition to the existing daily flights, customers now have more options to Chennai, with four additional weekly flightsto Southern India’s gateway city.
As part of the celebration of its increased capacity to this destination, the carrier is offering low fares for travel to Chennai, startingfrom S$160 one way. Travellers can start booking on line now.
In addition to Chennai, Tiger Airways also serves Bangalore fivetimes weekly. The increased frequency to Chennai reflects the carrier’s focus on India as a key destination. In total, Tiger Airways will have 32 flights per week between Singapore and India.
03/09/09 eTravel Blackboard

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