Business India: Jet Airways Kingfisher Airlines Finally start Domestic code share routes

business-india-jet-airways-kingfisher-airlines-finally-start-domestic-code-share-routes Two largest private carriers in India Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines are finally going to launch their business agreement about code share on domestic routes. The owner of Kingfisher airlines Vijay Mallya and the representative of Jet airways and Naresh Goyal signed an agreement to significantly rationalise capacity and reduce costs at a time when prices of jet fuel had hit record highs last October.

Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines, both based in India, have agreed to begin code-share on certain flights on domestic routes. In fact, the two airlines had announced in October 2008 that they were entering into what had been described as the largest operational alliance in the aviation sector of India. the alliance between the country’s two largest private carriers, Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines, finally took off on July 1.

“To start with, both the airlines have started sharing infrastructure at the domestic airports that include Delhi and Mumbai,” a senior Kingfisher Airlines official told ET on condition of anonymity

Apart from infrastructure sharing at airports, the code sharing between the two airlines will start this month. “The infrastructure and code sharing will reduce Kingfisher’s operational costs by 20-30%,” added the official. According to an official at Jet, code sharing on domestic and international flights will start soon, apart from joint fuel management and network rationalisation. E-mails and text messages sent to spokespersons of both companies remained unanswered.

Both the airlines have a large debt component on their books, apart from having been in the red. Jet’s debt is 3.1 billion dollar and had a standalone net loss of Rs 402 crore for FY09. Kingfisher’s loss stood at Rs 626 crore in the third quarter of FY09 from Rs 423 crore for the same quarter of FY08. “The airline business in India in terms of profitability faces an uphill task due to high charges that are paid out for operations,” said Raajeev Batra, head of transport advisory services, KPMG.

Business India: Jet Airways Kingfisher Airlines Finally start Domestic code share routes

Categories