IndiGo Will Be a Global Aviation Giant by 2030: CEO Pieter Elbers

As IndiGo stretches its wings to position itself as a global aviation giant, CEO Pieter Elbers speaks about the glide path to global domination while maintaining cost leadership. Edited excerpts:

What is IndiGo’s international action plan?

If you look at the decisions over the past two-and-a-half years, first we placed an order for 500 aircraft, the largest single aircraft type order in the world. We have a total of 900 planes yet to be delivered.

The second building block was making sure we cater to the aspirational India, which also needs a proper business class proposition. With more and more people taking flights, that’s where the loyalty programme comes in. For a long time, a lot of Indian international air travel was about connecting to places just outside India. We are embarking on the journey of internationalisation. These building blocks will make sure that IndiGo is a global aviation giant by 2030.

Will IndiGo’s DNA change as it goes International?

We’re not changing the fundamentals of the company. The three customer promises—affordable fares, hassle-free service, and on-time performance—are the foundations of IndiGo’s success. And that will continue. Knowing India and the Indian consumer, who is value-conscious, we have to remain competitive and retain our cost leadership. And service is one of the strongest assets of IndiGo. We will continue to build on that.

Which markets are you looking at for internationalisation?

We have quite a lot of success stories recently—Baku, Almaty, Tbilisi, Tashkent. Everyone knows Phuket, Singapore and Dubai, but these new destinations also work well. The number of foreigners coming to India is limited. It is a great opportunity.

What about planned international expansion over the next five years?

The first international flights of IndiGo about a decade ago were classically to the Gulf, Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia. The second step was Bangkok, Malaysia and Singapore. What we have done recently is expand to north and central Asia, to the west with a flight to Nairobi, and to the east to Indonesia. The XLR will bring us into parts of Europe, Geneva, Athens, etc. All these places are a huge opportunity. And then, with the A350, we can reach any point in the world from India. The further you go, the lower is the market share of airlines from India. So, there is an opportunity for us to serve those markets and offer a product that has great service, is cost competitive and has originated from India.

We started code shares with Turkish Airlines in 2023 because IndiGo was a well-known brand in India but not so much outside India. This helped us start creating a market position in Europe, in Australia, in different parts of the world.

What are your views on the opening of bilateral rights?

These bilateral rights were created in the past and were used to a limited extent by Indian operators. Both Air India and IndiGo are now starting to use those traffic rights.

Air India is also ramping up capacity on international routes. Do we see this duopoly going further?

Whether you’re Air India or IndiGo, the geographical position of India is the same, right? So, 65% of the world’s population lives within a five-six hour flying radius from India. The opportunity to connect in India is massive. And there’s quite a few flows from Africa to Southeast Asia; the quickest way is via India. If we want to compete with the big aviation giants in China, Europe, the US, we should have a certain size and scale. What’s happening in India is very much in line what happened in other parts of the world. It will create airlines that are able in size and skill to face that competition. And then yes, of course, we’ll compete with Air India. And that’s good. It keeps us on our toes. It keeps them on their toes.

What infrastructure upgrade is needed to make India a global aviation hub? 

One is hardware, just concrete, runways, gates and terminals, where a lot of investments are being done. Two is what I call software, the people. We need to start building an ecosystem with airports, airlines, producers, manufacturers. And that’s happening in places outside India, such as Middle East, Singapore, parts of China. I think we have the opportunity to build the same in India. Also, the overall regulation has to be tuned towards transforming India into a global aviation hub. Some of the things where we should review the competitiveness include local taxes on fuel.

@richajourno