Air fares have plateaued
Judith Wilcox, Regional Manager, India Subcontinent, Virgin Atlantic, spends a lot of time in India. She discussed the carrier’s plans with BT’s T. V. Mahalingam. Excerpts:
Question: What are your plans for the Indian market?
Answer: We have been operating for seven years in Delhi, and for two years in Mumbai and are very encouraged by the success so far. We are also keeping an eye on the big emerging markets in India like Bangalore, Chennai and Ahmedabad.
Question: What kind of competition will Virgin face if Kingfisher (from India’s ‘Richard Branson’, Vijay Mallya) were to fly to the UK?
Answer: I think competition is good. When the UK-India routes opened up, there was some excess capacity. The market took a while to grow into that capacity. Adding new capacity may not be a bad thing to do. We have seen a tremendous growth in traffic (from India) to America; so London can be used as a springboard to go to America. I am not sure if fares will come down. It all depends on the capacity addition. If you look at two years ago and now, fares haven’t changed much even though airline costs have gone up. I think today’s fares offer good value.
Question: What are your plans over the next year?
Answer: I think Richard (Branson) is a brand adventure capitalist. In every other market, the airline business has got in first and other investments have followed… be it mobile technology, music, trains… astronaut programme (laughs). I don’t think I can say more than that.
