Air India Plans North America Destination Growth

Air India’s move to a three-hub strategy in New Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru will position the airline to maximize operational efficiency, enhance connectivity and better serve the needs of its passengers, CEO Campbell Wilson said.

Speaking at the Farnborough Airshow, Wilson said the carrier had an ambitious plan to transform its network, saying the carrier’s route map before privatization often focused on “political rather than commercial ends.”

“We've done a lot of reconfigurations—firstly with a view to strengthening the Delhi hub, making sure it has connectivity and as many spokes as the aircraft we have allow us to operate,” Wilson told ATW.

“But Mumbai has been grossly underserved by us—that’s partly the fault of Air India but it's also because of airport capacity. It's effectively a single runway airport that’s almost full. We want to strengthen the Mumbai hub and take advantage of the new airport that’s opening outside Mumbai.”

Alongside Mumbai’s existing Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (BOM), a second airport serving the city is scheduled to open in 2025. Navi Mumbai International Airport is expected to handle 20 million passengers initially, rising to 90 million once future phases have been completed.

Additionally, Air India in April signed an agreement to develop a connecting hub at Bengaluru’s Kempegowda International Airport (BLR).

“Southern India is a different geography altogether and a very different catchment,” Wilson said. “We see an opportunity to build a hub at Bengaluru because the airport is new and has great infrastructure. From a geographical perspective, it also allows for connected flows from Africa, Middle East, Asia and Australasia.”

Earlier this week, Air India LCC subsidiary Air India Express launched nonstop service from BLR to Abu Dhabi, marking the airline’s first international service from the city. The carrier also confirmed plans to introduce Airbus A350-900 aircraft on two US routes in the coming months, offering daily flights from Delhi to New York JFK from Nov. 1, and 5X-weekly flights from Delhi to New York Newark.

On Air India’s North America plans, Wilson said: “In the US, we've added a lot of capacity into San Francisco—we’ve inaugurated Mumbai-San Francisco and Bengaluru-San Francisco—and have added capacity to New York.

“We're increasing frequency in Toronto, and we're looking at potentially another couple of destinations in the reasonably near future into North America. We see a big opportunity.”

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