Air India Pushes Jet Upgrade to Lure Back Disgruntled Passengers
Air India long languished under government ownership while cash-rich Middle Eastern rivals siphoned off travelers. Now the airline is trying to even the score with cheaper fares, fresh cabins and lounges as well as shorter layover times.
The multi-year turnaround program will initially focus on the airline's 27 Boeing Co. 787-8 Dreamliners that are more than 10 years old in some cases, with Air India seeking to complete a refit in early 2027. A second stage, involving older Boeing 777 widebodies, will start late next year, though that step is proving more complex because of issues with seat suppliers, Chief Executive Officer Campbell Wilson said.
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Air India's deadly crash could set back its ambitious growth plans
NEW DELHI, India -- Just 10 days before Air India Flight 171 crashed into a medical college hostel in Ahmedabad, killing 270 people aboard and on the ground, company CEO Campbell Wilson held a briefing with the global aviation media, where he laid out the airline's grand ambitions. "Anywhere we point an aircraft, I think we can probably fill it," Wilson stated confidently that morning here, where the IATA Annual General Meeting was taking place. Indeed, in the three-and-a-half years since India's Tata Group acquired the long-neglected carrier from the Indian government, it has been investing aggressively. Its goal: to reinvent Air India as a service-oriented airline, ready to take advantage of the economic dynamics that industry insiders widely believe make India's aviation sector primed for a wave of growth. Since being acquired by Tata, Air India has ordered 570 aircraft, including nearly 520 that have yet to be delivered. The airline has also completed mergers with Vistara and AirAsia India, both of which were already owned by Tata. Buoyed by the Vistara merger, Air India has more than doubled its international weekly frequencies since going private and has sharply boosted domestic flying. But now, as accident investigators search for the cause of the Flight 171 crash, the airline faces a new and different challenge. "No airline CEO wants to face a challenge of this magnitude," said John Strickland, director of London-based JLS Consulting. "But when you are trying to turn around an airline from decades of state ownership and revolving-door management and political interference, it makes it even harder." Even before Flight 171 went down, the Air India transformation was a daunting project. Underinvestment during its long period of state ownership had left the carrier with antiquated cabin interiors and obsolete IT systems, Wilson said. There had been no recruitment of nonflying staff for 20 years. When Tata bought the airline, one-third of the fleet was grounded and being cannibalized for parts. The airline has since put all but one of those 30 grounded planes back in the sky, spent $200 million to replace 43 IT systems and recruited 6,000 new employees. Buoyed by the addition of Vistara's modern fleet and by deliveries of new aircraft, including six Airbus A350 planes, 50% of Air India's fleet now offers either new or upgraded interiors, Wilson said. Still, there is much work to do. The airline has plans to retrofit 40 widebody aircraft by 2028, and in the meantime it is doing a lighter freshening of 13 Boeing 777s to tide it over while it awaits seat replacement availability. Operationally, Air India is still a laggard. In May, the carrier was on time 71% of the time, placing it in the bottom 15% of global carriers, according to OAG. India aviation ministry records show that for the fiscal year that ended on March 31, Air India was on time just 68% of the time, according to the New Delhi-based magazine BW Businessworld. The airline also continued to suffer net losses in 2024-25 fiscal year, though it did record an operating profit as turnaround efforts progressed, according to Indian media sources. Indian macroeconomics have been behind the Tata Group's investment plans. IndiaNote is set to surpass Japan as the world's fourth-largest economy. And through 2050, growth will average 5.4% annually, according to a forecast by the London-based consultancy the Economist Intelligence Unit. Meanwhile, even though India is the world's biggest country by population, Indian airlines are operating just 69 widebody aircraft, according to Bloomberg Intelligence fleet data -- a figure that is lower than the widebody fleet of Singapore Airlines alone. Lacking the capacity to meet demand, India has largely ceded international air service to foreign operators, especially the Gulf carriers. Indian airlines have just 21% of Indian international market share, Wilson said. Also, while India does have the third-largest domestic airline industry in the world, it's still just one-seventh the size of similarly populous China's, IATA figures show. "If the Indian traveler starts traveling at the same rate as the Chinese travelers, it's going to be enormous," Wilson said at the IATA conference. But, for now, growth ambitions will take a back seat at Air India as it deals with the Flight 171 tragedy. On June 16, the airline's chairman, N. Chandrasekaran, told employees at a company town hall that the tragedy should serve as a catalyst to build a safer airline, various media reported. Investigators could take months to determine the cause of the crash. If mechanical or technical issues with the flight's Boeing 787 Dreamliner or General Electric GENx engine are ultimately found responsible, Air India's reputational damage would be less dramatic than if the airline's own safety protocols failed. But no matter what, Strickland said, the accident dents the carrier's progress. "It's not like the airline was top of the heap in terms of reputation and loyalty from customers," he said. "Whatever the cause, it means that management will have to redouble their focus to prove that they can deliver a safe, reliable and high-quality product."
