Akasa Air Co-Founder On International Expansion and Profitability — India Report

11.06.2024 - 03:07 / skift.com / London Gatwick / Narendra Modi / Bulbul Dhawan

Low-cost carrier Akasa Air is on its path to profitability and will be expanding its international network, Indian news agency PTI said quoting Aditya Ghosh, the airline’s co-founder.

The airline that started operations less than two years, has expanded its network network to 25 destinations, including 3 international destinations — Doha, Jeddah, and Riyadh. The airline last week announced that it was set to commence operations between Mumbai and Saudi Arabia’s Riyadh from June 15.

Akasa has placed an order of 226 planes with Boeing, of which 24 have been delivered. The delivery of the remaining 202 aircraft will go all the way through to 2032.  

The airline is, however, not looking at having wide-body planes in its fleet, according to Ghosh. He said business models focusing on one type of fleet have done consistently well, as it leads to high asset utilization and cost control.

International Expansion: The company made its international debut within 19 months of its launch. The airline has also received traffic rights for Kuwait. The airline excutives have earlier mentioned about their plans to expand to South Asia and Southeast Asia as well, while also expanding into Tier 2, 3, and 4 cities in India. 

In an earlier interview with Skift, co-founder Praveen Iyer said that the airline’s focus is on capacity-constrained markets and robust traffic flows between India and the Gulf. 

The airline has flown more than 8 million passengers since its launch, and currently has a domestic market share of 4-5%. 

Gajendra Singh Shekhawat is the new Indian tourism minister in the newly-formed government headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Kinjarapu Rammohan Naidu has been named the new minister of civil aviation, taking over from Jyotiraditya Scindia. Ashwini Vaishnaw will continue to be the minister of railways.

With the Modi government coming back to power, it is expected that the policies and developmental work from the past decade would continue, even as there has been a 97% reduction in the overseas tourism promotion.

Over the past 10 years, India has been working on destination development and promoting domestic tourism. There has also been a significant increase in the number of airports in the country, more than doubling from 74 in 2019 to 149 at the beginning of the year. The regional UDAN scheme has been launched to enhance regional connectivity and make air travel accessible to smaller towns.

Several new trains, revamping of railway stations, and modification of railway infrastructure has also been undertaken. The country is expecting its first bullet train to be functional in 2026.

Full-service carrier Air India is set to commence non-stop flights between Bengaluru and London Gatwick. The service