India’s largest airline IndiGo is looking spread its wings by expanding services into China, Vietnam, Myanmar and Saudi Arabia and among other countries, PTI cited CEO Ronojoy Dutta as saying. “We will be looking to add new service to countries such as China, Vietnam, Myanmar, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) countries and also add frequencies in existing routes,” Dutta said in a communication to employees.
Half of IndiGo’s new capacity addition will be directed towards international operations, Dutta added. The airline would continue to build air-infrastructure to smaller cities, he added.
Other than being the leading domestic air carrier in India, IndiGo operates flights to 12 countries including Bangladesh, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Malaysia, Maldives, Nepal, Oman, Qatar, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and United Arab Emirates (UAE), all in Asia.
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Founded in 2006, IndiGo is a joint venture of Rahul Bhatia and Rakesh Gangwal. Bhatia’s InterGlobe had over 51% share in the company. Starting its operation in 2006 itself, the company replaced Air India in four years as the third largest airline in India, giving tough competition to Kingfisher Airlines and Jet Airways.
The company got international rights after five years of its operations. Its first international flight was from New Delhi to Dubai. It also shares a codeshare agreement with Turkish Airlines.
IndiGo became the most profitable airline by 2012. The same year, it overtook Jet Airways to become India’s largest airline in terms of market share.
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In 2013, IndiGo took another leap as it became the second fastest-growing low-cost airline in Asia, just behind Indonesian airline — Lion Air. The airline became public in 2015.
IndiGo is the country’s largest domestic carrier with a market share of 42.5 per cent in January. The carrier, which has more than 200 planes, operates over 1,300 daily flights.
