Air India Will Be a Premium Airline Again
That's what its CEO told me. I hope he's right. India deserves an airline worthy of its history, culture, and size.
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Dear readers,
As he nears his two-year anniversary as CEO of one of the world's more mismanaged airlines, Campbell Wilson has won three main victories for Air India. First, he placed orders for hundreds of aircraft with Airbus and Boeing that will allow Air India to grow and reach new markets while giving passengers a modern passenger experience. Second, he led a full rebranding that looks sharp (I think). And third, his team released a fresh safety video (with new, bespoke music) that celebrates India's cultural heritage.
It’s all promising, and it shows Air India is making progress under owner Tata Group, which bought the airline in early 2022. It also shows how much work remains. The fleet renewal has just begun — Air India has received a smattering of A320neos and A321neos, along with A350s that had been destined for Aeroflot and came with that airline's configuration, while Air India Express has received some 737 Maxes — and many more airplanes will come soon. The company said it expects to induct a new aircraft roughly every six days in 2024.
Still, under government ownership, Air India had become an industry joke. Passengers slammed Air India for its dirty airplanes (less of a problem now), and its anachronistic uncomfortable seats that often broke (still an issue.) It wasn’t difficult for Emirates, Qatar and Etihad to poach many of Air India’s passengers, who preferred overnight connections and itinerary-elongating stops in Dubai, Doha or Abu Dhabi to the Air India experience. Winning back those passengers will be no easy feat.
But Wilson will try. To get there, Air India has at least three priorities for the near future. First, the long-haul fleet will be retrofitted to modern standards, a project set to start soon. It probably says a lot about this airline that, until the A350s began flying in January, Air India's best long-haul plane was a Boeing 777-200LR it acquired from Delta and put into service without changing the configuration. Second, the company must decide what to do with Vistara, the more premium airline Tata is acquiring, pending government approvals. Wilson has said he will merge Vistara into Air India, but he recently told journalists it won’t happen until Air India's service is at an "appropriate level.” Third, the company must streamline its Air India Express division, a low-cost arm that will grow capacity significantly.
I could tell you all the reasons Wilson might fail, but I won’t dwell on that in this post because you all know how challenging it will be to retool this brand after decades of bad management, even if Wilson has backing (and lots of cash) from Tata Group. And remember: Wilson, a former Singapore Airlines executive, does not merely seek the standard turnaround where an airline culls the network, invests in new aircraft, and makes staff more efficient. He wants to remake Air India as a premium global airline, and that will take time and patience.
“The first response is triage,” Wilson told me. “The second is about building the engineering and IT culture, and the people, and the platform that a modern airline needs, much of it that was not present in what we inherited. Only when you've got those things in place can you actually start doing what you've wanted to do from the beginning, which is provide a quality service that the customer expects.”
I want Wilson to succeed. Part of it is practical: India needs a strong long-haul airline. Another piece is nostalgic. Air India was the airline in the 1960s and 70s, and wouldn't it be fun to see it regain its swagger?
For this reason, I had a light touch in my discussion with Wilson, with whom I spoke last month at the Aviation Festival in Singapore. We focused on Air India's long-haul plans, because I think that's what my international readers may find most interesting.
Here are highlights.