Indian aviation has shown tremendous resilience and potential by withstanding last 2 years of covid. 2022 was a revival year for the Indian aviation industry and now its time to make some money, it time to execute all the developmental plan and policies that was on hold for the last 2 years.
The government is bringing a lot of new policies like UDAN which will help the common man to travel by air and further increase the revenue stream of Indian aviation. We have also seen mergers between airlines which will increase profitability and sustainability.
The year 2023 is definitely going to be an important year for the aviation industry of India.
Let’s look at few factors that will reshape Indian Aviation in 2023
Mergers
Merging is not new but a popular trend going in the aviation industry that is expected to expand in 2023. Tata is emerging as a strong player in this market and is having command of multiple airlines.
After getting back Air India on its hand, Tata has planned to merge Vistara with Air India. Vistara is India’s second-largest domestic airline that holds a market share of 9.7 per cent while Air India has 8.5 per cent of the market share. Vistara has a parent body Singapore Airlines (SIA) that is getting a 25.1 per cent stake in the merged entity at an investment of Rs 2,058.5 crore (USD 250 million) in Air India.
After the completion of the merging process, the Air India group will have Vistara, AirAsia India, Air India and Air India Express. This merging process is expected to be complete by 2024. The group is already in the process to merge Air India Expres with AirAsia India, in order to provide low-cost flight options to travellers.
INFRASTRUCTURE
The government of India is taking a lot of efforts towards development of Aviation infrastructure. As the aviation sector is growing in terms of traffic, the number of airports are also going up. Recently new airports were inaugurated at Goa and Arunachal Pradesh.
The air traffic control (ATC), runway and terminal building of the Noida International Airport will be executed by December 2023. Ayodhya is also going to have its first airport by June 2023.
Another IT hub Pune is going to get added one more terminal to its international airport by May 2023. The country has 146 operational airports, heliports and water aerodromes. The government’s aim is to have at least 200 operational airports in the coming years.
Fuel
As we know fuel cost accounts for almost 20 to 25 per cent of the total expense of running an airline. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) expects oil prices to decline to USD 99 a barrel in 2023. The total industry’s fuel bill is expected to be nearly USD 229 billion in 2023.
The expected bill of fuel constitutes 30 per cent of total expense. The increasing air traffic is the major cause behind increasing fuel bills which eventually influences the ticket fairs of the airlines. Also ONGC plans on increasing its production and take a plunge into the production of AVGAS which might reduce the prices of fuel for aviation.
Aircrafts
Airlines like Akasa, Air India, Indigo are planning major expansion in the year 2023. Boeing and Airbus have reported multiple orders from different Indian airlines. As we know, more aircraft’s means more job openings.
Traffic
Did you know?? More than 84154849 passengers traveled by air in the year 2022. What an amazing number right. Though this number is lesser than the years when covid had not affected but it is still on the rise. The statistics is available on www.dgca.gov.in
Conclusion
Overall i feel this is the year in which Indian Aviation is going to boom. I hope strongly that it does. Thankyou for reading