News
Air India is seeking proposals for six wide body leases
March 17th 2017
Air India is back in expansion mode. The Mumbai-headquartered flag carrier’s CCO and board member, Pankaj Srivastava, told ATW at Berlin’s ITB last week that the airline is seeking proposals from lessors worldwide for six wide bodies from late 2018, either B787-9s or B777-300ERs. Read More » The Star Alliance member has 23 smaller B787-8s, 12 B777-300ERs and three B777-200LRs in its fleet.
Indian civil aviation minister, Jayant Sinha, said the carrier expects another four -8 Dreamliners before year-end: one in July, two in August and the last in October. Its original order was for 27 B787-8s.
In separate news, India’s comptroller and auditor general this week again criticised Air India for its controversial sale of five B777-200LRs to Etihad Airways in 2014. With debt spiralling out of control, Air India sold the five ultra-long-haul jets for US$67.3 million each, significantly lower than their evaluations.
“There were very few operators of B777-200LR and no sale of aircraft had taken place in the secondary market. Thus, the benchmark of the sale price was not available. Even in the reports of valuers, it was apparent the market price of $86-92 million per aircraft was indicative in nature,” said Air India’s financial advisor, Shri Venkat. The aircraft were on average six years old at the time of the sale.
