Edits, Columns & Analysis - January 2007

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Charting a smooth flight
Sudhir Chowdhary
Financial Express
Jan 29, 2007

Technology plays an intrinsic role in ensuring Air Deccan’s turnaround and bringing in efficiency
The low-cost phenomenon continues unabated. Hardly anyone took Air Deccan seriously when it launched low airfares in Indian skies in August 2003 with a solitary aircraft and a few passengers. Innovative use of technology across its entire operations changed its fortunes and now the company has, for the quarter ended December, 2006, posted a modest net profit of Rs 9.6 crore compared to a net loss of Rs 42.9 crore in the previous quarter.
Today, the airline has grown to a fleet of 40 aircrafts flying more than 300 flights a day with the widest network in the country. It has carried close to 7.5 million passengers since inception and is now the second largest carrier.
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Travel, sans the running around
V. Rishi Kumar
Hindu Business Line
Jan 29, 2007
The domestic aviation sector is up and flying, with the likely addition of over 200 planes over the next two-three years. With Indian business getting increasingly integrated with global markets, travel within the country and outside has become a lot more frequent. It is no longer a luxury but a business necessity.
Amadeus partners service providers, sellers and buyers in the travel space, with point of sale and other services. Ankur Bhatia, Managing Director, Amadeus, in a chat with eWorld, talks of the company's efforts to make air travel less of a hassle. Excerpts:
The Indian aviation industry is seeing boom times. How is Amadeus addressing this opportunity?
The boom in Indian tourism has benefited Indian travellers with outbound tourists from India growing at one million a year. In 2003, there were a mere five million Indians travelling out and in 2006, the figure is up to a whopping seven million.
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Most travellers prefer to pack bags themselves
Daniel Bardsley, Mohammad Shamseddine, Fuad Ali
Gulf News, United Arab Emirates
Jan 28, 2007

Dubai: When you check in for a flight, an airline staff member will often pose the question: "Did you pack your bag yourself?"
It's just as well they do these checks, because you can never be sure what might be hidden inside your luggage if someone else has packed it for you.
Just take the case of the Indian businessman detained earlier this month at Dubai International Airport. Nusli Wadia was questioned for three hours after a pistol and 30 cartridges were discovered in his baggage. A spokesman for Wadia said the weapon had been mistakenly packed by a member of his house staff.
In a Gulf News online poll, a large majority of respondents - 82 per cent - said they prepared their own luggage before a flight, while 18 per cent said someone else packed their bags for them.
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Brady reckoner: Find it, fix it, seal it
Cuckoo Paul
Economic Times
Jan 27, 2007
Bangalore: Most visitors entering the crowded HAL airport in Bangalore are more than likely to miss the somewhat plain-looking, two-storied building which sits cheek by jowl with the airport. About 20 people are huddled inside a tiny conference room on the first floor. The man at the head of the table keeps firing questions from a long list, a copy of which is available with the rest. The discussion, almost invariably, gets heated, and in the end, most of the points are scratched off the list. The man makes a few points about pending issues. It’s all over in 90 minutes.
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Asia Aviation Executives Upbeat
Chosun Ilbo, South Korea
Jan 26, 2006
Senior aviation industry executives say airlines in the Asia Pacific region are headed to robust growth in 2007. Ron Corben recently interviewed airline executives and they say lower fuel prices and the growing China market are boons for the industry.
The International Air Transport Association - IATA - has forecast that passenger flows across the Asia-Pacific region will see the fastest growth in the world over the next few years.
IATA says booming Asian economies and growing demand for travel from the region's expanding middle class give the market strong potential. In addition, rising traffic into and out of China will help boost the industry.
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Tough times for domestic airlines
Hormuz P Mama
Economic Times
Jan 25, 2007
India’s domestic airlines had handled a total of about 21 million passengers during 2005-06. This financial year, despite a 49% traffic rise in the first six months, it may total about 30% for the whole year. However, it will soon level out and the growth rate could even decline during the next economic downturn. Thus, over a five-year period, the average growth could at best be 20% a year.
By contrast, the airlines’ capacity increase has been explosive. India’s domestic airlines had a fleet of only 184 aircraft, big and small, by end 2005. In view of the unprecedented orders rate, with more to come, the total could be around 600 by 2010.
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Should I Really Give Up Flying?
Sam Wollaston
Guardian Unlimited, UK
Jan 25, 2007
Should I Really Give Up Flying?. Good question. And first we head off (by plane?) to India, where they're not so much giving up, as only really getting started.
When it comes to flying, India's full of scary facts. Scariest of all, I think, is that on Air Deccan, South Asia's answer to Ryanair, more than half the passengers on any single flight are first-time flyers. That says quite a lot about the rate at which flying is increasing there. There are a billion Indians - it makes a bit of a mockery of some guilty middle-class British family deciding to holiday in Cumbria instead of Umbria. But also: what must it be like on one of those flights, with more than half the passengers experiencing the terror of take-off for the very first time? Are there ever riots?
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Air Deccan as a child of reforms
The Financial Express
Jan 24, 2007
To global investors, the ‘India flying’ imagery is about a young man levitating with a laptop in some exotic location like Sikandra. To millions of Indians, though, ‘India flying’ is the dream that Captain GR Gopinath has conjured for them with his no-frills airline, Air Deccan. Barely four years old, this ‘open skies’ carrier is nosing past Indian (Airlines) with cut-price tickets that are posing competition to that old monopoly trundler, the Indian Railways. That this can happen, and that success stories like Captain Gopinath’s are still in the making, testifies to the dynamism of the liberalised Indian economy.
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Sky’s the limit for airport growth
Joe Leahy
Financial Times, UK
Jan 23, 2007
A curious sight greeted passengers being transported from their planes to Mumbai’s ramshackle airport terminal last week. Two dogs, oblivious to the surrounding melee of jumbo jets and baggage trucks, were happily jogging along the tarmac, looking for their next snack.
Such scenes typify the struggle by India’s creaky, under-invested airports to keep up with the country’s boom in air traffic as airline deregulation and rising economic growth drive a sharp increase in domestic tourism and business travel.
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Hurdles stare A-I, Indian merger proposal
K.R. Wadhwaney
The Tribune
Jan 21, 2007
Regardless of ‘assurances’ of job security and benefits/perks to staff, Minister of State for Civil Aviation Praful Patel’s ‘dream-scheme’ of merging two national carriers, Air-India and Indian, to rise as one entity has been hit by dense fog. The visibility of merger coming about before the end of March 31, 2007, as announced by the minister, is so inadequate that even staunch supporters of the move have been caught napping.
Judging from the existing scenario and realities that have emerged, keen aviation followers are of the firm belief that the proposal will not materialise in near future as the Group of Ministers (GoM) has asked the ministry to secure a ‘go-ahead clearance’ from the staff and the unions concerned, which have had a very dominating existence in two national carriers.
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We must harness total potential of aviation sector
Sid Khanna
Ex-managing partner, Accenture
Economic Times
Jan 17, 2007

The aviation sector in India has been rapidly gaining importance over the past few years with a catalytic effect on economic activity and growth. This is borne out by the entry of several players in the industry and active steps taken by the government to increase competition and provide a level-playing field.
However, there is still a long way to go in harnessing the total potential of the sector, with taxation and regulatory reforms driving growth. The sector provides two essential services: one, airlines operating from a commercial motive; second, a socio-economic objective of providing connectivity to foster trade and travel.
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Safety up in the air
Hindustan Times
Jan 17, 2006
The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has reportedly cast its net wide to induct scores of trainee air traffic controllers (ATCs). This couldn’t have come sooner, considering the severe shortage of ATCs. The current crop of ATCs at major airports — 190 controllers in Delhi, and an average of 125 in Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata — is stretched too thin on the ground. This could jeopardise safety. Unfortunately, estimates suggest that even the planned induction of a thousand new controllers may not be enough. India will need double that number in the next few years to keep pace with the increasing number of flights and new airports.
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Where is Indian aviation industry headed?
m-Travel.com
Jan 15, 2007
Going by the developments in the Indian aviation sector last year, not many doubt that there is enormous scope for growth in India’s air traffic over the next few years. Especially with low fare carriers spreading their wings to encompass more destinations with greater frequency.
In one of the interviews conducted during EyeforTravel.com’s inaugural conference in New Delhi in October 2006, Raj Halve, chief commercial officer, GoAir felt that supply growth will create its own demand over the years and hence a healthy growth of traffic of over 25 percent per annum is expected over the years.
In order to gauge how the Indian aviation industry is expected to shape up in 2007, EyeforTravel.com’s Ritesh Gupta spoke with Halve.
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The trouble with air travel
M. P. Ravindra Nathan
St. Petersburg Times, US
Jan 14, 2007

Since we have progressed in our ability to travel long distances frequently, one would think that travel would become easier. Globalization certainly has helped bring nations come closer, but international travel is entirely another matter.
My wife and I traveled to India via London and Dubai twice in 2006, and both trips were quite arduous. Our first trip was in January 2006. There were no "orange alerts" anywhere at that time. We had to board Virgin Atlantic Airways from Orlando. "You need to report three hours before the gate closes," the airline had informed us. So we were there very early. The line was already a half-mile long, winding along the limited space in front of the airlines counter. And it was moving ever so slowly. Our travel documents were checked over and over again.
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Price cuts bring boom back in aviation sector
Ranju Sarkar
Hindustan Times
Jan 13, 2007

Mumbai: There's a sense of optimism, amidst the gloom of rising losses in 2006, returning in the airline industry.
This is led by a drop in crude prices, rising occupancies and yields, while airlines have been able to raise money and rope in big investors and banks (aircraft financiers) more eager to lend money to Indian carriers.
Prices for jet fuel, which is the single-biggest cost for airlines, have come down nearly 12 per cent since November after oil majors reduced prices thrice since November, only increasing it last month. With crude prices falling further from $63 to $53, expect oil companies to further reduce prices from February 1.
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Winter chaos at New Delhi airport
MSNBC
Jan 12, 2007
New Delhi: It's winter in New Delhi, the city is shrouded in fog and the airport is, as usual, a scene of utter chaos.
In what's become an annual crisis, winter fog is again crippling air traffic in and out of India's capital, and the city's run-down domestic airport once again finds itself unable to handle the mass of frazzled and frustrated passengers crowding terminals as flight after flight is canceled or delayed.
"Bad weather is understandable, but there is no system in place here to take care of waiting passengers," said Nyena Ravi, 23, a software engineer from the southern city of Hyderabad. She was killing time Wednesday in one of three large tents set up outside the domestic airport for the thousands of people whose flights have been canceled.
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Weather-beaten
Telegraph
Jan 11, 2007
Every year, with the advent of winter, Goutam Mitra starts developing cold feet. A frequent flier, the Mumbai-based chartered accountant dreads the fog that descends over northern India at this time of the year to throw air travel out of gear and upset his travel plans. “Delays and cancellations are inevitable and I am left stranded in airports,” he says, adding that in the past, he has missed several important appointments, thanks to the fog.
Mitra isn’t the only one who’s wary of this climatic phenomenon. Each winter, hundreds of domestic fliers in India have their travel itineraries turned on their heads by the fog that sets in over north India — particularly over Delhi. The season of 2006-07 has proved to be no different thus far. Through December and early January, scores of flights coming to Delhi were diverted to places such as Chandigarh, Lucknow and Jaipur due to poor visibility at the capital’s Indira Gandhi Domestic Airport, while those scheduled to take off were forced to wait for better visibility.
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Airlines: 'Cooperative conflict' is the way to go
Moneycontrol.com
Jan 10, 2007
Look closely at the next air ticket you buy, and you will find a Rs 150 fee levied for `congestion charges'.
No, this is not a charge levied by the Airports Authority, and passed on to you.
It is a charge levied by the airline itself, because there is a lot of congestion and over-crowding at airports, which results in aircraft having to hover in the air or wait on the tarmac with their engines on, ready for take-off.
Because of this, gallons of fuel is getting burned every day.
Hence, the congestion charge.
How is an airline able to get away it?
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Jetting from Punjab to the rich lists in 40 high-flying years
Michael Binyon
Times Online, UK
Jan 08, 2007

India's decision to liberlise its laws on state ownership of airlines gave Naresh Goyal his chance to cash in
He started 40 years ago with barely 100 rupees in his pocket, helping a small Lebanese airline with its accounts. Today he is the sixteenth-richest man in India (and sixth-richest Asian in Britain), owns one of the fastest-growing airline fleets in Asia and has set his sights on competing with British Airways, Lufthansa and Air France.
Naresh Goyal, the founder and owner of Jet Airways, is a rags-to-riches story that says much about the power and muscle of the new India. He was one of the first Indians to recognise the importance of the Indian diaspora, one of the first to take advantage of economic liberalisation and one of the most astute in understanding that the burgeoning Indian middle class wants what the middle class everywhere wants: to go on holiday and see the world.
Today, at his elegant house facing Regent’s Park in London — where, as an expatriate Indian citizen, he has lived since 1991 — he looks back with amusement at his beginnings.
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Will fog continue to disrupt aviation?
Arun Arora
Associate V-P, DIAL
Economic Times
Jan 08, 2007
The fog surely inconveniences air travellers. The geography of the capital city and weather in and around the region results in fog being an annual feature. Fog-induced poor visibility results in delays, diversion and cancellation of flights during the winter. This is an international phenomenon — passengers across the world face similar problems.
But do we just get used to it — or can we work towards a solution that minimises delays, diversion, cancellation?
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Grounded, and not the foggiest notion of how to take off
Murali Krishnan/IANS
India eNews.com
Jan 07, 2007
As certain as the turn of season every year is the thick fog that descends over large parts of north India come winter. And with equal regularity every year, airports, especially Delhi's busy Indira Gandhi International Airport, turn into a battle zone with harried passengers and powerless airlines officials cursing each other and the weather.
The fog not only upsets the travel plans of thousands but more importantly spells major losses for airlines with hundreds of flights cancelled, delayed or diverted.
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Indian Aviation in 2007 - The Prospects
Capt. Anup Murthy
Desicritics.org
Jan 05, 2007
What's the bottom line going to be in 2007 for the average Indian flyer?
For the consumer, lower fares, more options to travel and better connectivity. Simple, anyone could have told you that. For the Airlines in India, more red ink as each one of them battle for the same piece of the ever expanding pie. Ever expanding pie must mean higher levels of income and profitability for the Airlines, right? Sorry, that was too easy, wasn't it? Passenger growth has been phenomenal, no doubt but the average yield has actually gone down.
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India's airlines look to fly high
Siddharth Srivastava
Financial Express.bd, Bangladesh
Jan 5, 2007
The potential for India's airline sector to take off is sky-high as investment and the demand for new pilots soars.
Last month, European aircraft maker Airbus, said it intends to invest US$1.0 billion in India over the next decade to meet high demand in one of the fastest-growing air-travel markets in the world.
The Airbus investment is part of a $500 million assurance to the Indian government, which recently ordered 43 Airbus aircraft for Indian, the state-owned domestic carrier, in a $2.25 billion deal.
Airbus has said it will spend $300 million in setting up a pilot-training school and $250 million on an engineering unit, both likely to be in the Indian technology hub, Bangalore.
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The fun has gone out of flying
Vaihaysi Pande Daniel
Guest Columns/Rediff
Jan 04, 2007
The tarmacs of our airports these days burst over with a rainbow of aircraft of umpteen private airlines.
And in holiday season it looks like virtually half of India is out flying.
We have reason to be proud of our 'open skies'.
But what about a few open airports, please?
Or some better behaved passengers?
And less callous ground staff?
Our airports are mowed over by ever-expanding crowds of passengers. If you happened to take a peek at either Delhi or Mumbai or Kolkata airport this month or last month you would have been shocked, like I was.
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Grounded by the fog?
www.ibnlive.com
Moneycontrol.com
Jan 03, 2007
New Delhi: It's that time of the year again when your travel plans go haywire all because of fog. It has almost become an annual ritual of sorts now, where around this time every year, flights and trains are delayed, passengers get stuck, and no one has any clear answers to give.
Some solutions have been provided for airlines, like advanced navigation systems, better training for pilots, but the ground reality is just not changing. There are more planes, more passengers, and even more trouble in the skies.
The question that was discussed on CNN-IBN's Face the Nation was, Is the indifference of airline authorities the real reason for chaos at airports?
On the panel of experts were Chief Operating Officer of Air Deccan, Warwick Brady and Swati Sugandh a passenger who like many others witnessed a harrowing time when it took over 24 hours for her to fly from Patna to Delhi.
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Action in the skies to continue
Raghvendra Rao
Indian Express
Jan 03, 2007
New Delhi: Airlines running into losses worth crores notwithstanding, the year 2006 will be best remembered for growth that the sector witnessed: 48 per cent in domestic passenger traffic and 32 per cent in total domestic aircraft movement (191,150 aircraft movements recorded between April-June). Government figures put the number of domestic passengers carried till November 2006 at 29 million, a record. Many feel that this is the kind of growth which will drive the civil aviation sector in 2007.
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Need more transparency in ATF pricing: Spicejet
Moneycontrol.com
Jan 03, 2007
Oil Companies have upped jet fuel prices by Rs 1,600-1,700 from January 2. MD & CEO of Spicejet, Siddanth Sharma discusses the same and explains how this will affect the airlines.
Excerpts from CNBC - TV18?s exclusive interview with Siddanth Sharma:
Q. Fuel costs average about 30-35% of most aviation company?s operational expenses. How will this price hike hit you in terms of operating costs and margins?
A: Fuel costs were around 40% of our total cost and this 5% increase would translate to about 2% increase in fuel cost. That would mean that on an average our monthly cost bill would go up by about Rs 1.5 crore. Add to that the woes of holding over Delhi and Bombay due to fog and other related issues.
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India's airlines look to fly high
Siddharth Srivastava
Asia Times Online, Hong Kong
Jan 03, 2007
New Delhi: The potential for India's airline sector to take off is sky-high as investment and the demand for new pilots soars.
Last month, European aircraft maker Airbus, said it intends to invest US$1 billion in India over the next decade to meet high demand in one of the fastest-growing air-travel markets in the world.
The Airbus investment is part of a $500 million assurance to the Indian government, which recently ordered 43 Airbus aircraft for
Indian, the state-owned domestic carrier, in a $2.25 billion deal.
Airbus has said it will spend $300 million in setting up a pilot-training school and $250 million on an engineering unit, both likely to be in the Indian technology hub, Bangalore.
"This is just the beginning - there will be much more," said Kiran Rao, president of Airbus India.
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BREAKFAST WITH BS: Kiran Rao
Flying high on Indian skies
Bhupesh Bhandari
Business Standard
Jan 02, 2007
New Delhi: Airbus executive vice-president clears the air on the company's India operations and the rivalry with Boeing.
Most Indian visitors to the Airbus headquarters at Toulouse in France are pleasantly surprised when Kiran Rao, executive vice-president (marketing and contracts, customer affairs), Airbus, serves them hot dosas with lip-smacking sambhar and coconut chutney. All made at home, with the choicest of Indian spices, by his wife. What few people know is that his wife is English (Bangalore-born Rao himself is a British citizen) — as far removed from South Indian delicacies as an Eskimo from swimming trunks, writes Bhupesh Bhandari.
If that doesn’t convince you that he is a marketing genius, you could take a look at the numbers. Rao has so far sold between 250 and 300 aircraft to various Indian carriers in the last few years. Read The Rest >>>

Stuck in thin air
Hindustan Times
Jan 03, 2007
There is very little one can do to drive away the fog in certain parts of northern India, including in New Delhi. But there is something that should be done to reduce the woes of air travellers across the country. Delayed flights, perhaps more than cricket and Bollywood, have united the country — except in this case weather conditions in one part of the country are throwing schedules out of control in other parts. The chaos stems from a dysfunctional system that does not, amazingly, factor in an event that has by now become an annual occasion: poor visibility. It seems rather odd that the airport authorities, not to mention airline companies continue to behave as if fog and bad weather conditions are affecting Indian skies and life below for the first time.
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