Vijayawadabased airline Air Costa, which has completed over one year of operations, will be adding two Embraer E-190s to its existing fleet of four aircraft by September as the airline looks to apply for a pan-India licence this April.
“In 2015, we will lease two Embraer E-190 aircraft. One is slated to be delivered in August, the other in September,“ Air Costa chief financial officer Vivek Choudhary said on Tuesday.
To support pan-India expansion of its operations, Air Costa had last year placed an order for 50 aircraft valued at $2.94 billion.The aircraft will be used to launch a slew of flights to newer destinations.
“We are keen on cities like Lucknow, Guwahati, Bhubaneshwar and New Delhi, among others. Many new players are focusing on Tier-II cities but our USP is that we have the first mover’s advantage in many of these centres,“ Vivek Choudhary pointed out.
Currently, the airline oper ates in nine locations Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chennai, Bangalore, Coimbatore, Jaipur, Tirupati, Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam.
Air Costa, which is carrying out demerger of the airline from its parent LEPL Group, is in talks with Private Equity (PE) players to raise funds for its expansion plans, said Choudhary.
The low-cost airline, which has clocked Rs 450 crore revenues since the launch of its operations 18 months back, is confident of achieving break even in the next one-and-a-half year despite competition heating up with new players foraying into the civil aviation market.
