National Aviation Company of India (Nacil), which runs national carrier Air India, has roped in SITA, an aviation IT specialist, to provide it a Horizon passenger services system (PSS) on a turnkey basis following a global competitive tendering process. The deal with the 13.5-million passenger airline is valued at $190 million (Rs 874 crore), and has a tenure of 10 years.

SITA?s Horizon platform provides hosted PSS services to 140 airlines boarding 120 million passengers and will be used to deliver a single airline code in order to allow the seamless integration of the former domestic carrier, Indian Airlines, with Air India for the first time since they merged in August 2007. Another early deliverable will enable Air India to meet the requirements for joining the Star Alliance.

In addition, SITA will also implement an efficient online booking engine, departure control system, check-in and automated boarding control, baggage reconciliation system (BRS) and a frequent flyer programme.

Arvind Jadhav, Air India chairman & managing director, said: ? Implementation of the Horizon PSS will complete the merger of Air India with the former domestic carrier, Indian Airlines, and enable us to align processes and systems to meet Star Alliance standards. Air India will then be able to leverage the complementary strengths and synergies of the single new carrier to the maximum, resulting in a more competitive, customer friendly and world-class airline with significant improvement in our passenger yields. ?

He added that this initiative will be achieved through maximum flexibility in the airline?s ?go to market? strategy and provision of an easy-to-use booking engine by SITA which will provide the airline full control over its own ticket distribution and drastically reduce distribution costs.

Francesco Violante, chief executive officer of SITA, said, ?It is a great honour for SITA to be the chosen technology partner of Air India as it begins in earnest the journey towards business transformation. SITA has been providing Air India with mission-critical services for more than 50 years, including network connectivity at all its domestic and international stations, check-in, air-to-ground communications, fares management and baggage tracing.? This announcement follows the recent successful migration of two major Asian airlines to the SITA reservations platform.

Earlier this year, Sriwijaya Air, Indonesia?s six-million passenger carrier, announced the completion of a successful migration to SITA?s Horizon passenger management and distribution platform.

SITA, which has won substantial new business in the sub-continent in recent years, is leveraging its growing presence in India to the maximum for the benefit of the Air India project. SITA?s workforce in India, along with its local partners ?? NIIT and Mindtree ?? now stands at almost 1,000 highly skilled personnel.