Market Share of Indian Domestic Airlines (Nov’12) – IndiGo Still Leads, Other Interesting Pointers
Indian aviation industry has seen many interesting events this year. 2012 is turning out to be a milestone year in the history of Indian aviation. Etihad Airways is reportedly in talks with Jet Airways and Kingfisher after the government approved foreign direct investment in Indian carriers. Captain Gopinath has received No Objection Certificate (NOC) from the government for launching a new low cost carrier. Captain Gopinath founded Air Deccan in 2003 and introduced the revolutionary low cost concept in India. The LCC model was well received and within three years of launch, Air Deccan became India’s number two airline in terms of passengers flown. Kingfisher Airlines was grounded in October 2012 after the Director General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) cancelled its operating license on grounds that it could not provide safe and reliable flights to consumers, after labour unrest and financial troubles.
Domestic carriers market share is fluctuating month-on-month. As per the passenger traffic data submitted by domestic airlines, total domestic passengers carried by scheduled domestic airlines in the month of November 2012 were 50.20 lakhs, comparatively this number was 45.55 lakhs in the month of October 2012.
However, the number of passengers carried by domestic airlines was 534.14 lakhs between Jan-Nov 2012 as against 550.33 lakhs during the corresponding period of the previous year.
Number of domestic passengers flown by domestic carriers:
- IndiGo is STILL leading the game with 27.3% market share followed by Jet group (Jet Airways + Lite) at 25.2%.
- Air India has an impressive 20.7% share, but this might be mainly due to the mandatory rule imposed for government employees and bureaucrats to fly Air India
- Market share of domestic carriers almost remained the same (by +/- 1%) compared to the month of September
- Kingfisher Airlines that had 3.5% share in September is no where in the picture now (it was grounded since October)
- It was reported that Vijay Mallya had submitted a revival plan for Kingfisher, if all goes ahead as planned, then by Q1 2013 Kingfisher will fly with with few flights (in phased manner)
- If Etihad talks with Jet and Kingfisher matures, then the scenario (in terms of market share) might change
- Captain Gopinath’s new LCC is reportedly planned to hit the sky by Q1 2013 as he has a non-compete agreement (when he sold Air Deccan to Mallya) with Vijay Mallya till Jan 2013
Author: Karthick Prabu
