razMJ

I've noticed that Jet Airways, Air India and Kingfisher Airlines all have new widebodies on order; Kingfisher for 15 A330s, 5 A350s and 5 A380s; Jet Airways for 2 777-300ERs, 10 787s and 5 A330s and Air India for 2 777-300ERs and 27 787s. Just wondering, what routes do you think these new aircraft will be used for, and any future cancellations/new orders?

Keyser

i'm definitely expecting cancellations from kingfisher & ai....

but even if there are no cancellations, i'm not expecting any new routes to be introduced at this moment by any of these airlines....

razMJ

Yeah, true. Jet Airways seems to have fared less badly I would say, but then again, living in Britain my info only comes from NDTV and some articles.
But as well as the possibility of new routes, are there any plans to use widebody aircraft to increase capacity on domestic routes, like in Japan for example they use widebodies on domestic routes that take even just an hour.

jasepl

Jet have cancelled the remaining 77Ws and converted those into more 737s. That's good, because the W was too much plane for Jet. They are taking delivery of the 333s I believe.

IT, well, "I'll take five of each please Noel" about sums it up.

With Air India, it's a different story every week.

abhilife2001

IIRC, I also read somewhere about Jet giving on wetlease some aircrafts to Gulf carriers..

PVDtoDEL

Air India could use some A330s/B767s. That's the perfect kind of plane to serve Europe. The 777 is just too big, and both the 777/787 are made for longer haul route structures.

razMJ

For Air India the 777 is fine for London, but not Paris and Frankfurt where Air France and Lufthansa are more successful.
The A330s, or multipurpose 787s, would do well on those routes, but also for launching new routes in Europe. There is high demand for a direct flight from MAN to India, due to the large Indian community there and businesses. PIA operates daily flights to Pakistan, but only serves the diaspora as there are less business links than there would be for a flight to BOM, DEL, BLR or MAA.

avm2806

Yes - but the diaspora business from UK to India is quite low yield and already quite over supplied. A direct flight to MAN would hardly be able to survive if it charged a hefty premium over a 1-stop service.

ATQ-LHR is a good example of a route that failed - both 9W and AI were offering it and it failed. If I recall correctly there was also some sort of flight to Birmingham from northern India that did not last very long.
Now BD operates a thrice weekly ATQ-ALA-LHR vv (guess they are clubbing traffic, and that kind of frequency works - although after they merge with BA who knows if it will last).
Point being - while an India - MAN is theoretically a great route, the yields would not justify it even if the loads and demand would.

gradybush

Yes, 9W is flying A330s on BOM - DEL now. Read it on their Facebook page.

razMJ

The diaspora business from London to India is well supplied, but not Manchester. 9W ATQ-LHR didn't itself fail, Jet dropped the route along with others at the start of the downturn so that it did not end up like IT and AI today. BHX-DEL by AI was unsuccessful because AI charged much more than it did from LHR for the flight and Birmingham is within a 100 min drive from Heathrow. Now, Indian Brummies either use a gulf connection from BHX or fly from LHR direct. Northern England's Indians however don't generally use Heathrow, their large population uses connections from MAN, unrelated to the price from LHR, unlike the Brummies. BHX-ATQ however survived as a charter flight until a few months ago, when the charter company itself collapsed. It was not well known, operated by an executive company charter and very difficult to book.
PIA operate daily flights from Manchester to Pakistan, and have a similar sized diaspora in Northern England, but don't have the business interest. Biman Bangladesh operate twice weekly to Dhaka and don't have business interest or a very large diaspora. In fact, PIA also operate to Birmingham and Leeds!
My last note is, that as you imply, if the prices are too high much of the diaspora will still prefer to pay for a connection, but I would say that roughly up to Ł50-80 per person extra compared to a Gulf connection and the flights would be very popular not only for diaspora and business interest to India, but also to SE Asia, Bangladesh and Nepal. So it does partially depend on the price, so they also need to get the aircraft flight. I'm not saying that daily flights to BOM and DEL would be the most successful, but 3/4 roundtrips a week for each to serve the large Gujarati and Northern Indian commmunities respectively would work out well, and the good connections from those airports.

razMJ

Just link on the AI 787s Air India Announces First 787 Route

PVDtoDEL

Both Biman and PIA are losing money by the bucketloads on these routes. They just can't compete with the convenience of the gulf carriers..

razMJ

But as I have noted, a route to India has the same, if not more of the diaspora business that PIA and Biman have, but will also have the higher yield business traffic, because of the strong trade links between UK and India (especially compared to with Pakistan and Bangladesh).

razMJ

Deleted - on other thread Air India announces Australia non stop

Buttwiser

You can still fly AI wide bodies on BOM-AMD (777), BOM-DEL (787) and BOM-SIN (330).