Bangalore: Air Deccan, India’s oldest and largest low-cost carrier owned by Deccan Aviation Ltd, will swap five leased turboprop planes with newer planes later this year to increase operational efficiencies with its new, single-largest shareholder, United Breweries Ltd’s Kingfisher Airlines. “We are looking at returning the oldest ATRs and replacing them with a new fleet,” said Ramki Sundaram, acting chief executive. “There are five of them and are leased.” The planes being replaced represent nearly a quarter of the airline’s 21-strong ATR fleet. Air Deccan also has 24 Airbus jets in its fleet. In the last six weeks since the United Breweries group, which owns Kingfisher Airlines Ltd, picked up a quarter-ownership in Deccan Aviation for Rs550 crore, with an option for another 20% through a public offer to shareholders, Sundaram, until 1 June the chief financial officer of Air Deccan, has been in the spotlight with a mandate to move the loss-making airline to profitability sooner than later. The ATR move is likely to be a precursor to a wider route rationalization exercise that Air Deccan could kick off, together with Kingfisher, to increase the number of seats filled, especially on routes involving small towns. “If we are (flying to) some remote location, where Kingfisher also operates, merge both and move from an ATR to an Airbus,” said Sundaram. “Or, we look at moving the timings in such a manner so that we can get more people to travel.” In an interview with Mint, Sundaram said that another top item on his agenda is to drive home the message that the airline runs services on time—Air Deccan’s on-time performance has been as high as 98.5% in recent months—and remove the popular perception of its flights being perennially delayed. Replacing Air Deccan’s cloth seat upholstery with leather is another priority to improve cleanliness, he added. Edited excerpts:
G.R. Gopinath (Air Deccan’s chairman) has said that the airline will break even this year. Are you on track?
Later this financial year. What I have said always is that we are looking to break even in a few quarters. It is a very dynamic environment, we are doing lots of things, it is difficult to predict exactly.
Is there a new-found urgency in trying to nudge those fares upward or get to profitability faster?
Ever since I came here (around four months), the urgency was always there to ensure that. But, whenever any investor comes in, when they invest large amounts of money, they want to see returns on that. And, it would be fair to say that one of my prime responsibilities is to ensure that (when) any new investor comes in, he is satisfied with his investments and that is how I get more investments or get the existing investors to put in more money.
Have there been any clear deliverables in terms of time that have been set on you?
No.
How has the last quarter been?