Virendra Pandit
Mumbai: After a number of airlines collapsed in recent years, India’s best-known investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala is considering to launch an ultra-low cost airline and acquire 70 aircraft within four years with an investment of USD 35 million.
In this airline, he would own a 40 percent stake.
He is expecting to get a green signal from the Union Aviation Ministry in the next 15 days, according to media reports on Wednesday.
The Akasa Air’s team will include a former senior executive of Delta Air Lines Inc., and is looking at aircraft that can carry 180 passengers, he told Bloomberg Television, the reports said.
Jhunjhunwala is known as India’s ‘Warren Buffett’ in a market that has seen some airlines collapse in the face of intense fare wars and high costs, besides the pandemic-influenced lockdowns. Until a few years ago, India was seen as the world’s fastest-growing aviation market.
He is now looking at opportunities to woo flyers with a brand new carrier offering low fares.
“For the culture of a company to be frugal you’ve to start off fresh,” Jhunjhunwala said. “I’m very, very bullish on India’s aviation sector in terms of demand.”
Even before the Covid-19 pandemic hit the world in early 2020, India’s airlines were struggling to survive. The Vijay Mallya-promoted Kingfisher Airlines, once the country’s second-largest domestic carrier, ended operations in 2012, and Jet Airways India Ltd., even after being approved to fly again, collapsed in 2019.
The pandemic and its restrictions hit the demand severely in India as well and the possibility of a third wave of Covid-19 is threatening recovery.
But Jhunjhunwala, who according to Forbes has an estimated net worth of about $4.6 billion, is going ahead with his dream project.
“I think some of the incremental players may not recover,” he said. “I’ve got some of the best airline people in the world as my partners