When my overseas clients fly within India we generally prefer three airlines: Jet Airways, Kingfisher and IndiGo. The first two are well known and have a long track record, but Indigo is India’s answer to Southwest Airways: low cost, no-frills, pride in being predictable. It is also the only one of the three that is presently profitable
This week, Gurgaon-based IndiGo became a launch customer for Airbus’ fuel-efficient A320neo with a memorandum of understanding signed for 150 aircraft, plus 30 standard A320s. This jetliner agreement, inked on January 11, represents the largest in aviation history, and will expand this low-cost carrier’s A320 operations. At list price this order would account for over $15 billion. See video here.
Indigo founders are erstwhile travel agent Rahul Bhatia and former US Airways President Rakesh Gangwal. Gangwal was a student at IIT Kanpur and graduated three years ahead of me. Look for Indigo to begin flying internationally in 2 -3 years just as Jet Airways has in its own right.
