Jet Airways India, which is undergoing a court-monitored restructuring, plans to return with a hybrid of premium and no-frills services that would allow the former airline to claw back market share while managing costs in the fiercely competitive Indian aviation market.
The bankrupt airline, now helmed by a new set of owners, will have a two-class configuration where business class passengers will be offered services including free meals, its new chief executive Sanjiv Kapoor said in an interview.
The economy class will, however, be modelled similar to low-cost carriers where flyers pay for meals and other services, he said. A successful revival of Jet Airways, which collapsed under a pile of debt in 2019 and became the first airline to enter a reformed insolvency resolution process, will be a major moment for India’s bankruptcy laws. The new owners - Dubai-based, Indian-origin businessman Murari Lal Jalan and Florian Fritsch, the chairman of London-based financial advisory and alternative asset manager Kalrock Capital Management - have pledged to make investments of as much as $120 million, Kapoor said.
Jet Airways will operate a so-called proving-flight - one or more test flights with no passengers to assess safety - as early as this month, using a leased Boeing 737, Kapoor said and added that this will immediately make the airline eligible for a flying permit. This permit allows the new owners to bring in investments and enables the airline to negotiate landing and parking slots with airports. “We are confident that we are very close to a proving flight,” Kapoor said.
