[rubicon]

Originally Posted by rubicon

Subramanian Swamy terms AI divestment a potential scam in the making.

Originally Posted by rubicon

Subramanian Swamy continues to oppose his own government's decision to sell Air India.

Subramanian Swamy again tweets against AI privatisation and goin to Tata's.

[srini1785]

Originally Posted by rubicon

Subramanian Swamy again tweets against AI privatisation and goin to Tata's.

Well, looks like he has to follow up on his words. Tata's are definitely in the race:

Tatas bid for Air India, 67 years after exit

Source:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/a...campaign=cppst

With patriarch RT having his hands full with Shapponji buy out tussle, which in all probability will be long winding and could outlive him, this move could be very risky for the group's future.

[shortbread]

Originally Posted by srini1785

Well....


With patriarch RT having his hands full with Shapponji buy out tussle, which in all probability will be long winding and could outlive him, this move could be very risky for the group's future.

It is way too lucrative!

The world's second most populous country, a massive non resident diaspora that fly home regularly, no other Indian international operator with the scale and size to compete.

A vrs scheme to get rid of the excess and the deadwood, hire from the large number of young experienced applicants who are looking for new employment. What air India needs is new management that will wash off the sarkari baggage.

[srini1785]

Originally Posted by shortbread

It is way too lucrative!

Yes, But not for the short term. Last checked Air india had a 23000.00 Crs bebt . I don't know what terms the GOI has proposed now. If it insists that successful bidder takes over this debt, i would advise TATA to bid at a token Rs 1.00 and that too since they have decided to bid.

Not to forget , its a airline business and not Amazon type e Commerce to provide fast ROI.

Originally Posted by shortbread

A vrs scheme to get rid of the excess and the deadwood, hire from the large number of young experienced applicants who are looking for new employment. What air India needs is new management that will wash off the sarkari baggage.

This is another part of the problem, i am again not sure on what conditions GOI is selling AI. If old baggage is part of it, i don't think it makes any kind of financial prudence.

Then again , we are talking TATA and they have two things.

1. Deep pockets
2. Deep connections.

So may be they can pull it off.

[ruzbehxyz]

Originally Posted by srini1785

Then again , we are talking TATA and they have two things.

1. Deep pockets
2. Deep connections.

So may be they can pull it off.

Well Tata will definitely have a plan.

Tata established Tata Airlines in the year 1932 and that was renamed as Air India in 1946.
So there could be an emotional attachment here as well.

[sagarpadaki]

Originally Posted by shortbread

It is way too lucrative!

The world's second most populous country, a massive non resident diaspora that fly home regularly, no other Indian international operator with the scale and size to compete.

A vrs scheme to get rid of the excess and the deadwood, hire from the large number of young experienced applicants who are looking for new employment. What air India needs is new management that will wash off the sarkari baggage.

And also the ones to look for the cheapest fare to fly to/from home. Not sure if it is a good idea to take on so much debt and enter a space where there is stiff fare competition.

[Neversaygbye]

The airline business is one of the most difficult to run and it is the rare airline that has been consitently profitable. Plus the business is extremely sensitive to external factors. Tatas would be extremely foolhardy to take over Air India when their existing airline ventures are both running at huge losses. TCS is cross subsidising all the loss making businesses but even that has its limits. The fact that the Ambanis and Adanis have not bid for Air India is a good enough indicator of what hard nosed businessmen think about Air India's long term prospects.

[padmrajravi]

Tata's bidding for Air India does not look like a pure business decision. I see it as yet another way to destroy shareholder wealth for some kind of false legacy emotions by Tata trusts. If there was a semblance of hope of making Air India profitable, Reliance, with all the government support it enjoys, would have jumped at the opportunity. Tata simply is not aggressive enough to turn around such loss-making PSUs.

In a way, Tatas are no different from these PSUs. Not surprising, considering most of these PSUs were started by them and taken over later by the government. I see this as yet another way to destroy TCS money. I really hope, this does not go through and Tata manages to make their own Vistara profitable without getting distracted.

[shortbread]

Irrespective of whoever buying it, Air India's potential is immense.

No other International Indian operator with the scale.
With the death of Jet (now moved from coffin to ICU), Air India is the sole International Indian operator. Rest of them like Indigo are only starting out, they are yet to fix routes, get slots allocated etc. Air India rules the roost as the sole Indian player.

A massive market
This is the worlds second most populous country and also home to the worlds largest non resident diaspora. The size of the market is humongous

Lots of underserved routes
One of the world's most underserved routes in the world as per Skyscanner is London- Kochi. This is just an example, international connectivity to India's tier 2 cities varies from bad to downright horrible. This has made way for the Middle East trio to milk these sectors.

Due to logistical difficulties like having to check out, customs and check in again, when using domestic ports like Mumbai/Delhi, people prefer International stop overs instead of the above two. Plenty of tier 2 so called 'International' airports only serve a handful of International destinations.

These airports are yearning for direct flights to popular International destinations.

Originally Posted by sagarpadaki

And also the ones to look for the cheapest fare to fly to/from home. Not sure if it is a good idea to take on so much debt and enter a space where there is stiff fare competition.

There is no fare competition if Air India is the sole operator in a route. The whole Vande Bharat exercise opened the operators eyes to a massive market that they had conveniently ignored.

If one is booking a ticket from London to Mumbai, yes competition is stiff. On the other hand book a direct flight from London to Amritsar, it is Air Indian monopoly! No competition whatsoever. The focus should not be to fight for a piece of the market, the idea is to create a market for oneself.

For eg. Traditionally Air India connected Indians all over the country to London by using the Mumbai/Delhi stop over. These stop over flights always left a bad taste in the mouth and no one opts for these. Rather than stopping over in Mumbai/Delhi and dealing with the ruckus of having to check out/Customs/Check in again/lost baggage/delayed flights/sub standard stop over experience.......people prefer using the Middle East trio and stopping over in airports like Dubai, Qatar etc.

Then things changed recently. As part of the repatriation exercise, Air India added more than half a dozen direct flight destinations from London. This was supposed to be short term, but the flyer then struck gold! Today apart from the regular destinations of Mumbai/Delhi, Air India flies from London directly to Kochi, Ahmadabad, Bengaluru, Goa, Kolkata, Chennai, Amritsar.....packed flights seeing consistent demand.

What was supposed to be for a few weeks are now multiple flights a week on a regular basis. Who exactly is the 'competition' on these routes? If one can fly directly to a destination and save 3-4 hours + the flights being cheaper......the likes of Emirates, Qatar do not stand a chance!

Imagine Chennai was the third busiest airport in India for international connections, but British Airways had a monopoly on the Chennai London route, charged what it felt like. Air India just realised this last month, no jokes. London is just the beginning, Americas, Australia, EU connected to tier 2 Indian cities......hundreds of underserved routes.

Air India has been sitting on a treasure trove for decades busy arguing with itself! What the operator needs is new management with the foresight to open this box and reap its rewards.

[moralfibre]

Air India's SWOT in my opinion:

Strengths:

- Pilot experience. Their pilots are unlike any other and come with really strong professional training in handling aircraft.
- Routes and slots that are untapped. Air India holds licenses and slots that are unmatched.
- Assets that are complimentary although diminished in value due to babudom and vested interests of directors in the past

Weaknesses:

- Corporate culture. Can't emphasise enough about it after reading this book by a friend's father who saw it up close: Link
- Ageing aircraft with dull interiors. Will require a lot of capital to spruce and modernise their fleet.
- Debt and the overall downturn of the airline industry

Opportunities:

- A growing economy with very little flying hours from rural India.
- Opportunity to build a Southwest out of Air India express and alliance air.
- Direct flights to EU, US, Far east
- Sole international carrier with the demise of Jet Airways

Threats:

- Pandemic has shotdown travel for the year and looks like it will go on for another
- Resurgence of the dead Jet Airways
- LCCs geared up for international forays
- Strikes is a favorite among their staff read the book.



Elaborating further:

Air India pilots are undoubtedly the best out there in terms of flying experience. Very recently an AI 777 lost all instruments in Newark approach and still brought the plane down safely.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-4CSfwcQ_M

Be it that or making that polar flight over when Pakistan shutdown their airspace. I believe they have enough potential. But, the staff is ageing and most are walking towards their retirement.

A 90+ year existence in the form of TATA Airlines and thereafter AirIndia as a PSU gives them a landing slot and flight to everywhere. You name it and they have clearances. It is a shame that many of these were traded off by politicians for fat and high traffic middle east routes. Emirates and others wouldn't have been as successful without this.

In addition to the above, Air India has tangile assets to monetise. Remember, Walmart got PhonePe complimentary and that itself is worth over a couple of billion dollars now. We'll see if SATS comes in this deal for the bidder too.

Air India's corporate culture has sunk. From where JRD placed it as an example of exemplary service and unmatched inflight experiences that inspired many like Singapore Airlines to follow suit to shoddy don't care attitudes the crew carries. It will take a lot to retrench these unionised bunch and start with fresh blood. Hope Tatas don't make the mistake of merging this culture with Vistara or Air Asia. Each have their own styles.

The flights require severe overhaul. From poor maintenance to outdated and dull interiors. This will be a very heavy capital intensive spend. Not to mention the time it takes to overhaul this. Someone with oodles of experience in this field is the only one to be in the captain's seat. Unlikely that it will happen over the next 3-5 years.

What Air India has to offer for Indian travellers is convenience. I cannot emphasise enough on the convenience of my DEL-SFO flight or any direct flight from India. Let me explain:

Typically all European or Middle eastern carriers have their departures lined up from Mumbai between 1am to 5am. This means I have to be at the airport say at 10pm for a 1am flight. Which translates to a 6pm departure from Pune in a cab. This adds up to stress, loss of 7 hours of productive / recreational time. Once at the airport, you are pretty much in the dead zone of sleep and cannot help but tire yourself out. Add to that, a quick 3-4 hour flight later, with enough sleep deprivation, one has to go through the routines of security checks and another few hours of wait for the connection. A flight to the west coast of the US takes between 15-16 from that time. Landing slot is around the same time when most carriers get in. That leads to a long long queue for immigration and customs. By the time you are out, you are drop dead tired!

Compare that to my PNQ-DEL-SFO flight. It takes off at 10:30pm from Pune airport which means I have to be at the airport at 8:30pm. My bags get checkedin through and through towards SFO. A quick hour and half flight later, I reach DEL at midnight and clear security in under an hour via a separate connection desk within the airport. You are at the gate at 1-1:30am which gives you about half an hour to shop in duty free and get yourself at the gate. The flight departs at 3ish am and makes it comfortably in 16 hours to the US via a trans-Pacific route. You reach SF at 6am when there is pretty much no other international flight. You are out of the gate and at your hotel in under an hour from the time you touch down.

I only wish the inflight experience and overall customer services improve for their planes.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by moralfibre

Air India pilots are undoubtedly the best out there in terms of flying experience. Very recently an AI 777 lost all instruments in Newark approach and still brought the plane down safely.

Some further insights and opinions on the Professional Pilot forum on this particular incident:

https://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/...ia+ils+failure

Has there ever been a formal incident report released?

Anorak fact: This flight used the same flight number 101 as the infamous Air India I101 crash into Mont Blanc in 1966. Which happened to be almost the exact same spot as where Air India 245 that crashed there as well some years earlier.

Unfortunately, when you google Air India a lot of crashes start showing up.

Jeroen

[shortbread]

Originally Posted by moralfibre

Weaknesses:

- Corporate culture. Can't emphasise enough about it after reading this book by a friend's father who saw it up close: Link


Air India's corporate culture has sunk. From where JRD placed it as an example of exemplary service and unmatched inflight experiences that inspired many like Singapore Airlines to follow suit to shoddy don't care attitudes the crew carries. It will take a lot to retrench these unionised bunch and start with fresh blood. Hope Tatas don't make the mistake of merging this culture with Vistara or Air Asia. Each have their own styles.

I agree..... the employee attitude/culture needs a major overhaul. I know I am wrong in painting all Air India staff the same, but the rot is too deep for a handful of sincere employees to fix. The good is heavily outweighed by the bad!

So what is the solution?!

1) Create new operation bases

The challenges in Mumbai and Delhi AI bases are well known + both airports are expensive to operate from.

The flyer needs to find new bases, for eg. a South base covering the 5 southern states OR an East base serving WB, North East, Bihar etc..

- This diversification will help create new teams that are not exposed to Air India's toxic work culture.
- It will help the local economies in these bases.
- Greater cost savings compared to Mumbai or Delhi.
- It will better serve the nearby states with shorter International connections. For eg a new Southern base like Bangalore/Kochi will get a bulk of the direct International flights to the US, EU, Australia etc and then have domestic connections ready to other southern cities like Hyderabad, Chennai, Trivandrum, Coimbatore etc. Or if passengers want, choose their own means like Bus, Railways and head to the final destinations; which will not be feasible if flying into Mumbai or Delhi.

This is better than dumping everyone in Mumbai or Delhi.

2) Inject fresh blood and retain your best

This is self explanatory.
There will be no dearth of young applicants in India. Plus the aviation industry has seen a lot of layoffs lately, which means experienced and skilled personnel are available to be recruited. A domestic example is Jet which laid off staff. Internationally, operators like Emirates, Etihad, Qatar that have laid of thousands.... many of whom are Indian citizens. Experienced, well trained, skilled personnel with the right attitude will be a big boon vis a vis the tired entitled faces that customers currently suffer.

3) Finally, get rid of the rot!

Once the new owners/management have prepared additional regional bases, start to heavily dilute their Mumbai and Delhi operations. Air India's two main centres is entrenched with the deep rooted behaviours that the public detest. Sarkari care free attitude, lack of professionalism, zero customer focus, strong unions etc....With alternatives available Air India cannot be held to ransom anymore by the Mumbai/Delhi staff.

Immediately begin to scale down in Mumbai and Delhi. VRS, terminations, transfers, fumigation, forest fires whatever... there is a lot of deadwood that needs to be removed...eradicated.

There will be pushback, no doubt. Traditionally political leaders in Maharashtra and Delhi have always backed Air India unions. Shiv Sena is an example.... because AI unions are vocal and also a big vote bank. Well, who cares because the current ruling party will not. Both states have rival parties in power and any form of political pressure will fall to deaf ears.
Jo ukhandna hai ukhaad....dekhte hain!

I know most of this will fall on deaf ears. Tata especially will look to continue to operate from Mumbai where it is deeply entrenched. This, I think will be a massive mistake.

[moralfibre]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Some further insights and opinions on the Professional Pilot forum on this particular incident:

https://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/...ia+ils+failure

Has there ever been a formal incident report released?

Don't think there was a formal incident report released. Their ground maintenance is surely terrible. No two ways about it. While I did speak good about their DEL-SFO flight. The few that they use to operate this route are VT-ALF, VT-ALG, VT-ALH. Each of these have suffered some incident or the other.

A bust door mid-flight. A fire on the ground in the APU and worst, one of these was left to rot on the tarmac for cannibalising parts for other aircraft when their management was in doldrums and a lot of agenda was run by politicians to crash this airline to the ground.

Unfortunately, when you google Air India a lot of crashes start showing up.

Jeroen

True that, their safety record is rather poor and I believe atleast 2-3 were clearly pilot errors. Rest I haven't tracked. My optimism was in regards to their flying hours.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by moralfibre

My optimism was in regards to their flying hours.

I have mentioned this before on some of the aviation related threads. There is very little correlation between number of flying hours of a pilot and the statistical change of him/her being involved in a fatal crash! Pilot unions don’t want to hear that, but that is what the research shows.

In General aviation it is even less than in commercial aviation. E.g. when you fly in a single engine plane with me, a low hours pilot, or a pilot with 20.000 hours, the statistical change of meeting with a fatal accident are identical.

The FAA and other regulators too, have done a lot of investigation and research into this very topic. The single most relevant factor is attitude of the pilot, not number of flight hours. Experience can help you deal with a difficult situation, but attitude prevents you from getting yourself into trouble in the first place!

There are many aspects to attitude and what contributes to one’s attitude. Culture, upbringing etc being some of them.

KLM, to date, still holds the record for having caused aviations’ worst crash in souls lost (Tenerife Panam KLM crash). At the time their most experienced captain in flight hours. But he was also a very arrogant, listen to nobody kind of captain. (not that unusual in those days, but still)

Jeroen

[moralfibre]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

There are many aspects to attitude and what contributes to one’s attitude. Culture, upbringing etc being some of them.

Totally, having watched a pile load of aircrash investigations series I agree.

KLM, to date, still holds the record for having caused aviations’ worst crash in souls lost (Tenerife Panam KLM crash). At the time their most experienced captain in flight hours. But he was also a very arrogant, listen to nobody kind of captain. (not that unusual in those days, but still)

Jeroen

True that.