GMR Airports Submits Bid for New International Airport in Greece
India – Bid submitted in consortium with GEK Terna Group of Greece – The bid is for Development, Operations and Management of the new airport for a concession period of 35 years GMR Infrastructure Limited, India’s leading Infrastructure Company, today announced that its subsidiary, GMR Airports Limited (GAL), has submitted the bid along with its partner GEK Terna Group of Greece for the Development, Operations and Management of New International Airport of Heraklion at Crete Island, Greece. The scope of the project involves Design, Construction, Financing, Operation & Maintenance of the airport for a concession period of 35 years. GEK Terna Group is a leading Greek Infrastructure company having presence in Construction, Energy, Mining, Waste management, Concessions, Real Estatedevelopment & facilities’ management. It is understood that this is the sole bid for this concession. Upon award, GAL will be the airport operator for this project. Under the Bid conditions, it is mandatory for theairport operator to hold a minimum of 10% equity stake in the consortium. Commenting on the development, a GAL Spokesperson, said: ‘The bid submission is in line with the GMR Group’s asset light growth strategy with value build up from this project coming to GMR more from leveraging the airport platform, leading to enhanced revenue based services, than just equity. Lee Roy Selmon Womens Jersey
India is Changi Airport’s seventh largest country market, accounting for 6.1% of the airport’s total passenger traffic
Heading into 2017, Changi Airport will be offering more flight options for travel to India. A total of 13 weekly services[1] will be introduced between now and the end of the year, representing an addition of nearly 2,300 weekly one-way seats to India. Traffic between Singapore and India is at an all-time high. Today, India is Changi Airport’s seventh largest country market, accounting for 6.1% of the airport’s total passenger traffic. For the first ten months of this year, passenger traffic to and from the India market rose 5% year-on-year to reach 2.94 million movements. For the month of October, India had the strongest year-on-year growth (+12.4%) among Changi’s top ten country markets. In 2015, Changi Airport saw a record 3.43 million passengers travelling between Singapore and India. Riding on the strong travel demand on routes to India, Indian carriers will be injecting capacity to the cities of Kolkata, Chennai and Bangalore. From 20 November, Air India Express will launch 4x weekly services to Kolkata. It will also step up its Chennai services, newly-launched in October, from 5x weekly to daily services. Meanwhile, Jet Airways will be launching a new daily Singapore-Bangalore service from 14 December; this follows after the airline boosted capacity by switching to a widebody aircraft for their daily Singapore-Mumbai flights earlier this year. Brandin Cooks Jersey
Fresh fare war among Airlines
Budget carrier SpiceJet announced its ‘Spicy Annual Sale’ on Monday offering all inclusive one-way fares for as low as Rs 737 for travel to select destinations on its domestic network. “The four day sale launched today will be open till midnight, 24th November, 2016 whereas the travel period covered is from January 9, 2017 to October 28, 2017. The starting fare of Rs 737 all inclusive is applicable on sectors like Chennai – Coimbatore – Chennai, Jammu- Srinagar – Jammu, Chandigarh – Srinagar – Chandigarh and Agartala – Guwahati covering distance upto 500 kms,” SpiceJet said. Jason Kidd Authentic Jersey
India’s air passenger traffic continues its double digit growth
India’s air passenger traffic grew by 23.20% in October as compared to the same period last year with airlines carrying 86.72 lakh passengers. Passenger traffic grew by 23.18% in the first ten months of 2016 (January-October) as compared to the same period last year with domestic airlines carrying 813.7 lakh passengers. IndiGo had the highest market share of 42.6% among airlines followed by Jet Airways (17.1%), Air India (13%), SpiceJet (12.9%) and GoAir (7.9%). Vistara and AirAsia India had a market share of 2.7% each. SpiceJet had the occupancy among domestic airline clocking a load factor of 91.9% followed by IndiGo (84.9%) and GoAir (84.4%). The overall cancellation rate was 0.72% in October with Air Carnival having the highest cancellations (8.74%). “During October 2016, a total of 790 passenger-related complaints had been received by the scheduled domestic airlines. The number of complaints per 10,000 passengers carried for the month of October 2016 has been 0.9,” the Directorate General of Civil Aviation said. Daniel Alfredsson Womens Jersey
India’s airport count to double by 2019, says civil aviation minister
The central government is planning to increase the number of airports across the country in the next two-three years. The aim of this expansion is to tap into the largely untapped domestic aviation sector in India, which has witnessed a sharp rise in the number of passengers, Jayant Sinha, the Minister for Civil Aviation said. Earlier during the year, the BJP government launched a draft UDAN scheme (Udey Desk ka Aam Nagrik) which fixed the fares at Rs 2,500 for one hour flights in a bid to make it affordable to the citizens. “Our party in its 2014 elections manifesto announced the UDAN scheme, under which, we have to expand the number of airports. The fact is we have 75 airports with scheduled services. We will double it in the next two to three years,” Sinha was quoted as saying by Press Trust of India. The central government aims to increase funds by about Rs 400 crore to run the UDAN connectivity scheme. Some of the leading airlines were asked to bid for the sectors that provide connectivity to other major airports, while carriers who bid with the lowest rates would be awarded the routes. This was aimed at developing regional routes that are “under developed” with increased profitability. “When bids are finally given out in January 2017, we will create an entirely new regional market,” Sinha told PTI. More people choose to fly when compared to opting for rail journeys every year. India’s air passenger growth grew about 10-11 percent during the last decade. Wayne Gretzky Authentic Jersey
Policies will deliver infra, services thrust to aviation: Sinha
The Centre is keen on ensuring that the aviation sector is equipped with adequate physical infrastructure and skilled human resources to face growth challenges over the next 15 years, Union Minister of State or Civil Aviation Jayant Sinha said here. The aviation sector is expected to treble in size in the next ten years. Over 140 million people fly annually now and this is more than the estimated 130 million who travel by air-conditioned railway coaches, Sinha said, adding that there was huge headroom for growth. The Centre is putting in place policies to establish multi-tiered infrastructure and quality services, the Union Minister said, addressing the third annual G Ramachandran Memorial Lecture, organised by the Southern India Chamber of Commerce & Industry on Saturday. Infra boost The recently-announced UDAN regional connectivity scheme for short-distance air services to connecting small towns with larger hubs will be in place early next year and is one element of the planned infrastructure. Airlines will now bid for these services, which will potentially bring into use over 17 under-served airports and 400 unused airports. Currently, there are 75 airports with scheduled services. The airlines will bid for viability gap funding, he said. The regional services will help launch commuter and feeder services, link remote locations with each other and enable niche offerings like spiritual tourism, he said. Over the next 10 years, the airport network will also be trebled, with existing airports in major cities being developed as global hub airports, creation of green-field airports, regional hubs and major cargo and manufacturing hub airports. The quality of customer services will also be improved by bringing together service providers and stakeholders to ensure comfortable travel and resolution of complaints. A mobile app will soon be launched for complaint registration and assured response, he said. On demonetisation Sinha said the decision to pull out ?500 and ?1,000 notes from circulation will deliver multiple benefits. As people surrender these notes, bank deposits will grow, tax base will expand and the black or parallel economy will be compressed. Counterfeit currency will also be pushed out. Digital payments will grow, which is a cheaper option than currency-based transactions, he said. Mark McGwire Jersey
Govt’s equity flow choke might block Air India revival path
Air India’s turnaround plan would be hit by a proposed curtailment in government equity infusion, the airline has informed the civil aviation ministry. Air India received Rs 1,713 crore of equity in the Budget, against its requirement of Rs 3,900 crore. The airline had requested the remaining Rs 2,200 crore to be released in the supplementary Budget. But the finance ministry has turned down the airline’s request. Lower equity infusion could result in increased finance costs and impact the turnaround plan, the airline has told the government. Air India is on a Rs 30,000-crore government bailout package and has till now received Rs 23,993 crore in equity, including Rs 1,713-crore investment this year. The infusion fund was to take care of the cash deficit and to be used for loan repayment. The airline was hoping to retire debt using the equity infusion in 2016. Last week, Air India Chairperson Ashwani Lohani wrote to the civil aviation ministry highlighting the perils of reduced equity infusion. The airline has sought the ministry’s intervention in the regard. Lohani confirmed to Business Standard he has written to the ministry. “Air India’s huge debt burden is a legacy of the past. It would be impossible to manage unless we are given full equity,” he said in response to a query. Lohani has in his letter pointed out that the airline was on an expansion mode and leasing aircraft, making it essential to have sufficient liquidity to take care of commitments. Further, he said, the airline would be forced to raise temporary loans from banks to bridge the liquidity gap, which might endanger the survival of the company. Ryon Healy Jersey
Things Looking Good, Will Continue Investing: AirAsia India CEO
Emphasising that things are looking good for the airline, AirAsia India CEO Amar Abrol has said it will continue to make investments and expand fleet size to 10 in the current financial year. The no-frills carrier, which took to the Indian skies in June 2014, also expects to have a headcount of around 1,000 by the end of March next year. AirAsia India, a joint venture between Tatas and Malaysia’s AirAsia Berhad, came into focus recently after ousted Tata group Chairman Cyrus Mistry alleged fraudulent transactions worth Rs 22 crore had happened in the carrier. Currently, the airline has eight aircraft and two more would be added in this financial year, Mr Abrol said, adding that the staff strength is expected to reach around 1,000 during the same period. Presently, the airline has a staff strength of 800-850. “We will have around 1,000 people, hopefully by March… Things are looking good and we continue to invest in India,” he told PTI. The budget carrier had 2.3 per cent share in the domestic aviation market at the end of September quarter. It flew 5.89 lakh passengers in the three months ended September, an increase of 42 per cent compared to the year-ago period. Without divulging specific financial details, Mr Abrol said the airline has been seeing gross profit since the new management took over in March. He came at the helm of the airline in March this year. “I think since March when the new management took over, we have been gross profit positive,” he noted. Draymond Green Authentic Jersey
Small wings can make big flights
In a few years, a passenger from Ramnad may not have to take a 10-hour train journey to Chennai or a road trip to Madurai airport to fly abroad. He or she can take a nine-seater aircraft from Ramnad and fly to Madurai or Trichy, and then board a connecting flight to Mumbai, Delhi, or the rest of the world. Flying between small towns is going to be the norm if the ministry of civil aviation has its way in developing regional connectivity. In Tamil Nadu, more than 14 unused airstrips and a few underserved airports have been identified for this purpose. These include airstrips in Arakkonam, Chettinad, Cholavaram, Hosur, Kayatar, Neyveli, Ramnad, Salem, Sulur, Thanjavur, Ullundurpet and Vellore. Some of these were built by the British during the Second World War while others used to be private airstrips for the rich but now defunct. The airstrips could be used to fly nine-seater to 18-seater flights so that people from the hinterlands can have easy access to bigger airports, said Union minister of state for civil aviation Jayant Sinha detailing the Centre’s plan to develop air connectivity in the next 10 years. The ministry is trying to encourage private entrepreneurs to invest in these facilities for basic infrastructure if airlines show readiness to operate. Airports Authority of India too has been considering developing small airports with frugal facility like a hall as the terminal. In the southern peninsula, the density of airports is high. There are eight airports with good passenger traffic. The airstrips identified for development are scattered in such a way that these can connect people in remote areas to the existing airports for onward journey. However, airlines have to bid for these routes. The bidding is likely to happen in January. Two defence air strips – Tambaram and Arakkonam – are also included in this and are expected to be opened up for civilian aircraft if airlines show interest. Golden Tate III Womens Jersey
India To Double Airport Count In 2-3 Years, Says Jayant Sinha
The government plans to double the number of airports in India over the next two-three years, Minister of State for Civil Aviation Jayant Sinha has said. “Our party had in its 2014 election manifesto announced the UDAN (Uday Desh Ka Aam Nagrik) scheme, under which we will expand the number of airports,” the minister said, delivering the 3rd G Ramachandran Memorial Lecture organised in Chennai on Saturday night. “The fact is we have 75 airports with scheduled services. We plan to double it in the next two to three years,” the minister said at the event organised by the Southern India Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SICCI). Earlier this year, in a move to make flying more affordable, the government unveiled a draft UDAN scheme with an all inclusive fare of Rs. 2,500 for one-hour flights. The scheme is aimed at developing underdeveloped regional routes, Mr Sinha said. Declaring that the government would raise about Rs. 400 crore to run the UDAN scheme, the minister said the government is asking airlines to bid for those routes that provide connectivity to other major airports. “When bids are finally awarded in January 2017, we will create an entirely new regional market,” he said. A.J. Derby Jersey