It’s an exciting time for aviation in India. A little over a year ago, India’s largest airline ordered wide body jets for the first time. The airline has now doubled its firm order, before even taking delivery of the first jet.
In this post:
IndiGo will fly the Airbus A350 as of 2027
IndiGo now has a firm order for 60 Airbus A350-900s, in addition to options for an additional 40 of these jets, meaning the airline would eventually fly 100 of Airbus’ flagship wide body aircraft. IndiGo placed the firm order for 30 A350s in April 2024, so the development is that the firm order has just been doubled, from 30 to 60 jets.
The airline expects to take delivery of its first A350s as of 2027, so we’re still a couple of years off from these planes joining IndiGo’s fleet. I find it noteworthy that the airline has exclusively ordered the smaller A350-900 variant, rather than the larger A350-1000 variant, given that the latter has even better unit costs, and Indian airlines don’t exactly struggle to fill seats.
For context, IndiGo is an Indian low cost carrier that was founded in 2006 and is now run by Pieter Elbers, the former CEO of KLM. IndiGo is India’s largest airline in terms of the number of passengers carried.
The airline currently has a fleet of over 400 aircraft, comprised primarily of Airbus A320-family jets. The pace at which IndiGo is growing is almost unheard of. For example, in 2023, IndiGo placed an order for 500 Airbus A320neo family aircraft, the largest single aircraft order in history. The airline has nearly 1,000 aircraft on order.
While IndiGo primarily operates domestic flights, the airline also has an international route network, with select destinations in Africa and Asia. While these A350s are the first wide body aircraft that IndiGo has ordered, the airline has previously ordered the A321XLR, which is Airbus’ new narrow body, long range aircraft.
IndiGo has sort of been dabbling with wide body aircraft for some time. In 2023, the airline started operating a couple of Boeing 777s in partnership with Turkish Airlines, flying primarily between Delhi and Istanbul. Now the airline is wet leasing Boeing 787s from Norse Atlantic, so that it can start to operate some long haul flights.
How will IndiGo’s business model evolve with the A350?
It’s fascinating to see how IndiGo’s business model has evolved over time. Historically, IndiGo has been a low cost carrier, and it goes without saying that the economics of being a low cost carrier are very different on short haul domestic flights than they are on long haul international flights, especially given the competitive landscape.
However, IndiGo has been making changes, slowly but surely. The airline has introduced its IndiGo Stretch product on select Airbus A321neos, which is essentially a regional business class product. IndiGo has also now announced plans to partner with Delta, Air France-KLM, and Virgin Atlantic.
As IndiGo continues to grow and expand, it sure sounds like the airline will become increasingly full service, given that this is where money is to be made on long haul flights. Presumably IndiGo will be going head-to-head against Air India in many international markets, with the wide body aircraft being used for flights to Europe, the United States, etc.
It’s an incredibly exciting time for aviation in India. We’re seeing Air India undergo a full transformation, and now IndiGo is evolving significantly as well. What’s certain is that there’s no shortage of demand for travel to and from India, so there’s room for multiple Indian airlines to succeed.
If anything, these updates are about Indian airlines reclaiming market share from Gulf carriers, rather than anything else. For so many years, Gulf carriers have essentially been the de facto national carriers of India, and that’s slowly changing. I can’t help but wonder if a decade or two down the road, this could also lead to changes in the business model at Gulf airlines.
Bottom line
IndiGo now has a firm order for 60 Airbus A350-900, in addition to 40 options. These planes will start to join the carrier’s fleet as of 2027.
It’s fascinating to see IndiGo’s evolution. The airline has historically been an all-economy low cost carrier, and it’s increasingly becoming premium, and partnering with global, full service airlines. IndiGo is already starting to dabble with long haul flying, thanks to Norse Atlantic 787 leases, but things will really start to get exciting in 2027.
What do you make of IndiGo’s Airbus A350 order, and the carrier’s evolving partnerships?
"I can’t help but wonder if a decade or two down the road, this could also lead to changes in the business model at Gulf airlines."
I'm curious to see this as well. But I think Emirates and Qatar have evolved enough now that they aren't as dependent on traffic to the Indian Subcontinent as they were in the past. They would need some changes. But Dubai and Doha are now much more internationally known...
"I can’t help but wonder if a decade or two down the road, this could also lead to changes in the business model at Gulf airlines."
I'm curious to see this as well. But I think Emirates and Qatar have evolved enough now that they aren't as dependent on traffic to the Indian Subcontinent as they were in the past. They would need some changes. But Dubai and Doha are now much more internationally known cities. Those airlines have put their cities on the map. Nowadays, both of those airlines' are also dominant or well established in many other connecting markets as well. I'm sure they will lose passengers. But Emirates future does not consist of A380s, and they will have to adopt lower capacity aircraft. With natural growth over the next couple decades, I think the growth of Indian airlines will just result is less exponential growth for Emirates and Qatar. Qatar more recently diversified their typical passenger types. They were heavy on passengers to the Indian Subcontinent up until the pandemic, where their strategies and decisions allowed them to also grow market share in more diversified markets. My first time flying QR was in 2018 from JFK, and almost all of their passengers were flying to the Indian Subcontinent at the time. Not so much nowadays.
It will be interesting to see how the smaller Gulf Carriers do, like Oman Air and Gulf Air. I'm most intrigued about how this will impact Riyadh Air. Will they be able to grow enough market share before AI and IndiGo establish themselves?
It just struck me how much the Indigo branding/livery looks like bmi. It's uncanny lol. I look forward to living out my days watching certain airlines collapse and say, hey, famous last words.
"I can’t help but wonder if a decade or two down the road, this could also lead to changes in the business model at Gulf airlines."
Possibly. But if the Indian airlines stick to only (or even primarily) offering long-haul services from New Delhi, Mumbai, and Bengaluru, then it won't force the Middle Eastern carriers to change all that much, since the other major cities will still be faced with a connection.
For example, last...
"I can’t help but wonder if a decade or two down the road, this could also lead to changes in the business model at Gulf airlines."
Possibly. But if the Indian airlines stick to only (or even primarily) offering long-haul services from New Delhi, Mumbai, and Bengaluru, then it won't force the Middle Eastern carriers to change all that much, since the other major cities will still be faced with a connection.
For example, last I looked, Hyderabad-Dallas is the largest non-DEL/BOM market to the USA from India, and a sizable one at that. But if Air India or IndiGo were to launch DEL/BOM to DFW, they'd have no competitive advantage over Emirates or Qatar, as anyone coming from Hyderabad would still have to make a connection regardless.
The range of the a350-900 is 15 000 km up to 17 000km in the long range version....distance between those cities is just 11 000km so it can be flown direct.
I’m sure you mean “non-stop” not “direct”
@lucky, there is a lot of capacity that is going to be coming online in the next decade in India and the Middle East. Presumably a decent chunk of that capacity will be used for flying to/from Europe.
But most European airports are fairly slot constrained, making me wonder where Qatar, Emirates, Indigo, Air India etc. plan to send all their new capacity within Europe. Sure there is probably some room for further growth...
@lucky, there is a lot of capacity that is going to be coming online in the next decade in India and the Middle East. Presumably a decent chunk of that capacity will be used for flying to/from Europe.
But most European airports are fairly slot constrained, making me wonder where Qatar, Emirates, Indigo, Air India etc. plan to send all their new capacity within Europe. Sure there is probably some room for further growth but at some point I would imagine the major European Airports will run out of slots/capacity.
And it doesn't seem like Europe is running to build more runways for their airports either which is the most logical explanation of where increased expansion would come from.
Perhaps I am missing something here?
I wonder if they would introduce a flatbed product similar to ZipAir or maybe even Condor
When I access your page or boardingarea from chrome on a laptop, it really slows down and it seems like some changes in the ad is causing the issue. do you have any idea? I don't have the same issue on mobile devices or other pages with chrome in my laptop (even more heavy loaded pages). Anyone else experience the same?
No problems with Apple products …. :-)
No problem with Samsung either.
Ignore the Apple supremacist above.
Puts a lot of pressure on Tata and SQ to do more than put out a new ad. Now they actually have to deliver a good product if they want Indians to continue to choose them for long haul in 2030 forward. Let’s see who can take delivery of more new birds over the next 5-7 years and if AI can completely transform its culture.
Can we see them become more like jetBlue?
Hopefully they're successful compared to India's carriers of past such as Kingfisher and Jet Airways. Kingfisher had ambitious plans especially with the A380.
Oneworld can certainly use an Indian carrier as it's a major hole in their network aside from China, Africa and Latin America.
And that reminds me, have you or other readers ever been on the latter two? I remember both of them used JFKs Terminal 8.
They have 65 percent of India’s domestic market. And they run an on time operation. Pretty sure JetBlue would like to be more like IndiGo than the other way around.
I was talking more on service and amenities rather than operations.
jetBlue is defined as a low-cost carrier, but with full-service amenities.
Fair but on a busy route like DEL to BOM that takes all of two hours isn’t the first thing you are looking for a reliable operation? Indigo is delivering that. Do they have bad legroom? Sure but not exactly the average height of a Nordic population either.
Completely agree that one world looks flat here. Suggests a bit of a lack of outward vision from BA/IAG.
Are you talking about Jet and Kingfisher? Jet did fly out of JFK and EWR. Kingfisher's plans never materialized. They did apply for slots at JFK, but then they collapsed right around that time. Their flashy owner is a fugitive now, I believe.
Indigo does not offer JetBlue like amenities. Their best attribute is reliability. They are adding Indigo Stretch business lite service domestically. I am told that Indigo Stretch serves cold meals because their aircraft are not yet fitted with ovens.
Thus far Indigo's international routes are typical LCC services. They are slowly adding business class lite (IndiGo Stretch) to some domestic routes. It will be interesting to see if they take the competition head-on or they will continue to offer LCC like flights internationally with these 350s.
One is starting to get the feeling that India and its airlines are about to emerge strongly onto the world markets …. watch out AA!
Sheer greed and overexpansion that think will turn a super efficient/profitable business into downfall as happened to most lccs in the us
The duty troll can count …. now there’s a thing!
Now, now, don't be nasty to Pilate's Fwiend.
You mean DickusRumpus, of course...
That’s three India stories in a row
@ BiggusDickus -- Indeed, not surprising, since the IATA AGM is being held in India this year, and it's normal for a lot of announcements to come from airlines in the host country.
@Ben - to your point on A350-900 vs A350-1000, I think there’s a growing demand for premium travel esp long haul ex-India. UA’s 787-9 to DEL has Polaris flying full consistently. This may have been played into the aircraft choice.
Ben, placating the like DickusHead will never work.
Slapping the numpty down and putting it back in its box is the only solution!