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Jet and Kingfisher join forces

13 Oct 2008 by Mark Caswell

Indian airlines Kingfisher and Jet Airways have announced a “wide ranging” alliance, including codesharing on domestic and international flights, and common access to frequent flier programmes.

Naresh Goyal, chairman of Jet Airways said that the alliance “represents a completely new industrial model for aviation in India”, and would deliver “huge cost savings and revenue enhancement opportunities” for the two airlines.

The proposed alliance include codesharing on domestic and international flights, joint fuel management, common ground handling, cross selling of flight inventories, joint network rationalisation, cross utilisation of crew, and joint access to each airline’s frequent flyer programmes.

Jet and Kingfisher - which between them account for around 60 per cent of the domestic Indian aviation market – also said they would examine co-branding opportunities, and “have formed a core committee of senior management personnel from both companies who will drive the various identified initiatives forward”. However the two airlines will maintain their legal and brand identities, and there will be no mutual equity investment between the two carriers.

High fuel costs and a faltering global economy have hit the Indian aviation market hard, with Kingfisher deferring delivery of 32 Airbus A320 aircraft, and Jet Airways announcing it will discontinue its Mumbai-Shanghai-San Francisco route from January 13, 2009, as part of the "optimization of its long-haul international network". This transpacific route was inaugurated only a few months ago (see online news March 26).

For more information visit jetairways.com, flykingfisher.com.

Report by Mark Caswell

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