Originally Posted by
shahadil
The 787 is the 310 replacement for Air India.
This is a great point which is overlooked far too often.
Originally Posted by
shahadil
We all are getting clouded by Australia,Japan and Europe but we need to realise the 787 market is also for the middle east, south east and particularly Saudi Arabia, which lies beyond the reach of the airbus 320 family and too near for the 777, along with hong kong.
The Saudi market is largely within the reach of the A320. And for the route pairs which aren't within reach of a nonstop A320, the yields will be low enough that a connection won't really make a difference anyway.
Where AI can use the 787 most effectively as an A310 replacement is East Asia (NRT, ICN, KIX, PEK, CAN, PVG, HKG) and Southeast Asia (KUL, SGN, MNL).
The other wild card for usage is North Africa, and the western-most part of the Middle East. Routes like IST, CAI, NBO, AMM and TLV are outside A320 range but would be well served by 787. There are also opportunities in Central Asia/CIS, with Russia, Kazakhastan, and Tajikistan both being potentially commercially viable (low competition, high yielding if AI can get the loads). Moscow and Almaty are potential destinations which are especially notable.
One thing you can notice in common about all the routes mentioned above is that none are particularly premium-heavy. And considering that AI would probably not be able to capture the premium market even if it was there, there is little purpose of not putting in Y instead.