Vistara, the joint venture domestic airline between Tata Sons and Singapore Airlines, will ramp up operations and rapidly increase new routes, the airline’s newly appointed Chariman Bhaskar Bhat has said.

“The company has just begun to establish a network. Expansion needs to be more rapid. I’ve just joined so I need to see what else needs to be done,” Bhat told BusinessLine .

Vistara currently has only nine aircraft in its fleet and expects to add four more this year. Yet, it flies to only 12 destinations in India. According to Bhat, both routes as well as frequency of flights need to improve.

‘5/20 no hurdle’

Bhat added that the delay in India’s first civil aviation policy, which is expected to get rid of the 5/20 rule for airlines, may not be a hurdle for Vistara’s expansion plans.

“It will not have any impact on the expansion plans on Vistara. Domestic aviation is a very large market. If it gets accelerated, it will help. But our business model is not based on going overseas,” Bhat said.

The 5/20 rule restricts any domestic airline to start international unless it has a fleet of 20 aircraft and operational experience of five years.

Vistara, a joint venture between Tata Sons and Singapore Airlines wherein Tata Sons hold 51 per cent and Singapore Airlines holds the remainder, completed one year in operations this month. Tata’s long awaited foray into aviation has not been aggressive as the market expected it to be.

Low market share

Vistara has been able to grab a market share of only 1.9 per cent in a rapidly growing aviation sector. The airline also has the lowest passenger load factor, with 22 per cent of all its flight seats going empty on an average. The airline however maintained the best on-time performance at 90.6 per cent in the month of December, far surpassing all other domestic airlines.

Bhat, also the Managing Director of Tata Group-controlled Titan, took over as chairman of Tata SIA Airlines, succeeding Prasad Menon who retired on January 13.

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