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Jet Airways is the second largest Indian airline based in Mumbai, Maharashtra, both, in terms of market share
[4]

and passengers carried.

[5]

It is owned by Naresh Goyal. It operates over 400 flights daily to
[6]

76 destinations worldwide. Its main hub is Mumbai, with secondary hubs at Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru and Pune. It has an international hub at Brussels Airport,Belgium. The recession forced Jet Airways to discontinue the following routes: Ahmedabad– London, Amritsar–London, Bangalore–Brussels, Mumbai–Shanghai–San Francisco andBrusselsNew York.
[7]

It also had to put an indefinite delay on its expansion plans. Jet Airways was forced to

lease out seven of its ten Boeing 777-300ERs to survive the financial crunch. Due to the recession all flights to North America were operated on an Airbus A330-200 replacing the Boeing 777-300ERs. It also had to sell a brand-new, yet-to-be-delivered Boeing 777-300ER in 2009 and had to defer all new aircraft deliveries by at least two years. The airline planned to restore the Mumbai-Shanghai route by the end of 2011 but never went through with it.
[8]

As the economic crisis in the eurozone countries

worsened, Jet also closed the Delhi-Milan route.

[9]

1992-2009: Inception and growth

SM Centre, the former head office

Jet Airways was incorporated as an air taxi operator on 1 April 1992. It started commercial operations on 5 May 1993 with a fleet of four leasedBoeing 737-300 aircraft. In January 1994 a change in the law enabled Jet Airways to apply for scheduled airline status, which was granted on 4 January 1995. Naresh Goyal – who already owned Jetair (Private) Limited, which provided sales and marketing for foreign airlines in India – set up Jet Airways as a fullservice scheduled airline to compete against state-owned Indian Airlines. Indian Airlines had enjoyed a monopoly in the domestic market between 1953, when all major Indian air transport providers were nationalised under the Air Corporations Act (1953), and January 1994, when the Air Corporations Act was repealed, following which Jet Airways received scheduled airline status. Jet began international operations from Chennai to Colombo in March 2004. The company is listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange, but 80% of its stock is controlled by Naresh Goyal (through his ownership of Jet’s parent company, Tailwinds). It has 13,177 employees (as at 31 March 2011).[10]In January 2006 Jet Airways announced that it would buy Air Sahara for US$500 million in an all-cash deal, making it the biggest takeover in Indian aviation history. It would have resulted in the country's largest airline but the deal fell through in June 2006. On 12 April 2007 Jet Airways agreed to buy out Air Sahara for INR14.5 billion (US$340 million). Air Sahara was renamed JetLite, and was marketed between a low-cost carrier and a full service airline. In August 2008 Jet Airways announced its plans to completely integrate JetLite into Jet Airways.[11] In October 2008, Jet Airways laid off 1,900 of its employees, resulting in the largest lay-off in the history of Indian aviation.[12] However the employees were later asked to return to work; Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel said that the management reviewed its decision after he analysed the decision with them.[13][14]Jet Airways and their rival Kingfisher Airlines announced an alliance which primarily includes an agreement on code-sharing on both domestic and international flights, joint fuel management to reduce expenses, common ground handling, joint utilisation of crew and

sharing of similar frequent flier programmes.[15] On 8 May 2009 Jet Airways launched its low-cost brand, Jet Konnect. The decision to launch a new brand instead of expanding the JetLite network was taken after considering the regulatory delays involved in transferring aircraft from Jet Airways to JetLite, as the two have different operator codes. The brand was launched on sectors that had 50% or less load factor with the aim of increasing it to 70% and above. Jet officials said that the brand would cease to exist once the demand for the regular Jet Airways increases. [edit]2010-Present:

Rise to India's largest airline

A Jet Airways ATR 72-500

According to a PTI report, for the third quarter of 2010, Jet Airways (Jet+JetLite) had a market share of 26.9%[16] in terms of passengers carried, thus making it a market leader in India, followed by Kingfisher Airlines with 19.9%. In July 2012, Jet Airways officially sought government approval to join Star Alliance.[17] In June 2011, Jet Airways banned carrying fish, crab, meat, poultry products and liquid items as check-in baggage.[18] Jet is the first domestic airline to impose such a ban. Jet claimed that passengers complained of their baggage getting soiled by seepage from bags containing meat products. Early in 2013, Etihad Airways, on of the flag carriers of the United Arab Emirates based out of Abu Dhabi planned to buy a stake in Jet Airways. Jet announced that they were ready to sell a 24% stake to Etihad at US$330 million. Earlier, in September 2012, the government of India announced that foreign airlines can take up a stake of up to 49% in Indian airlines, thereby making this deal possible. Etihad, which had already purchased stakes in 4 other loss making airlines, said, they were "concentrating on future potential rather than past performance", and were ready to take up the stake in Jet.[19] Initially, Jet announced that they were likely to sign the stake sale deal with Etihad between January 22 and February 3,[20] which they later confirmed to as January 25.[21] However, the date passed by and the deal was further postponed.[22] Meanwhile, Jet Airways concentrated well on revenues, costs and network side, which resulted in the airline making profits for the first time since the rupee depreciation. Nikos Kardassis, the Chief Executive Officer of Jet Airways said "The combined impact of higher yields and lower costs (ex-fuel) have resulted in significantly lowering the breakeven seat factor levels in the business."[23] The airline announced a sale on its website, which offered 2 million seats for travel within India, till December 31, 2013. This sale was announced a little over one month after rival low-cost carrier SpiceJet announced a sale, which was expected to have triggered a fare-war.[24] High airfares throughout 2012 due to grounding of Kingfisher Airlines caused passengers to opt out of air travel, leading to negative growth in traffic for the first time since 2009. Jet Airways planned to attract more passengers by subsequently lowering the fares, which was followed by SpiceJet again. With two airlines offering cheaper travel, India's flag carrier started losing passengers and it too offered cheaper tickets. This was followed by IndiGo and GoAir, resulting in a full-fledged fare war.[25] Jet had introduced four different slabs of discounts depending upon the distance to destination. Under the offer, the fare up to 750 kilometres was priced at 2250 (US$41), while for 750-1000 kilometres it was 2850 (US$52). For air travel over a distance ranging from 1000 to 1400 kilometres, tickets were sold for 3300 (US$61) and for travel beyond 1400 kilometres, tickets were sold for a maximum of 3800 (US$70).[26] Based on a calculation by The Economic Times, on average, Jet Airways was selling 6400 tickets per day, or 14 tickets per flight at these discounted rates. According to the news agency, several Indian travel sites started experiencing sever issues

following a sudden increase in bookings. MakeMyTrip chief operating officer Keyur Joshi said that this move would help airlines increase aircraft occupancy from 75% to 85%.[27] However, soon after the sale, the airline's market value started going down.[28] This drop in market value was considered to have happened because of the indefinitely postponed Etihad deal. The stock had fallen by 18% in a period of one week. Economic Times reported that "The froth that developed around Jet stock was largely deal driven and has now fizzled away."[29] [edit]Criticism [edit]Issues

and Controversy

with US authorities

It took Jet Airways more than two years to get the necessary clearances from US authorities to fly to the United States. The US State Department gave the go-ahead on 15 November 2006. Jet was initially expected to begin service toNewark via Brussels in June 2005 but a problem arose in March 2005, when the airline submitted an application to the U.S. Department of Transportation. Nancy Heckerman, CEO of US company Jet Airways Inc. based in Bethesda, Maryland, opposed the application in letters to the Transportation Department alleging trademark infringement. Though the litigation is still unresolved, the Department of Transportation concluded it was not a reason to prevent Jet from flying to the U.S.[30] A second and more serious allegation that delayed Jet Airways being permitted to fly to the United States focused on its opaque ownership structure as well as its alleged links to organized crime in India and abroad. Jet Airways was originally set up as a subsidiary of Tailwinds, an Isle of Man-based holding company designed as a tax shelter, whose sole shareholder was Naresh Goyal, the airline's non-resident Indian (NRI) founder and chairman.[31] Initially, bothGulf Air and Kuwait Airways had acquired minority stakes in the airline. However, the Government of India subsequently decreed that foreign airlines would not be allowed to own any shares in any Indian airline (though other foreign entities and individuals could still acquire or own minority stakes in Indian carriers.[32]

Jet Airways Boeing 777-300ER at San Francisco International Airport.

As a result of this ruling, Gulf Air and Kuwait Airways sold their stakes to Naresh Goyal, who then became the airline's sole shareholder. Jet Airways floated a minority stake of around 20% on the Bombay Stock Exchange in 2005 to enable it to reduce the debt that had been accumulated since its inception as well as to fund its fleet expansion programme, including the acquisition of a fleet of new Airbus A330 and Boeing 777 long-haul wide-bodied jets to operate new long-range services, primarily to Europe and North America. This resulted in a reduction of Tailwind's stake in the airline to just below 80%.[33] According to the company's articles of association, the bulk of Naresh Goyal's shares in Tailwinds are held on behalf of several other individuals who all seem to be resident citizens of India. While Indian government officials have been satisfied that these arrangements do not compromise Jet Airways' status as an Indian-owned airline that is effectively controlled by Indian citizens, they were viewed as "problematic" by the American authorities.[30] The US aviation authorities were also concerned about the controversy surrounding Naresh Goyal's citizenship. There have been reports in the Indian media that he was an Indian-born, naturalized German citizen, with legal

permanent residence in the UK. This does not apply to Germany as it does not allow dual citizenship in general cases, unlike the UK, US, Canada, Australia and the Netherlands for instance, which do allow dual citizenship.[34] Had these media reports turned out to be true confirming that Jet Airways was effectively controlled by Naresh Goyal through his majority ownership of Tailwinds, the US authorities might have construed this as a violation of the "open skies" bilateral air services agreement between India and the US as well as international aviation law. Aviation law states that an airline must be substantially owned and controlled by citizens of the country where it is based in order to qualify as a "flag carrier" representing that country. This means that if Jet Airways were effectively controlled by a German rather than an Indian citizen, its traffic rights between India and the US and possibly other countries as well might need to be renegotiated under the German-US "open skies" bilateral aviation accord. In addition, the US and other countries could ask the Indian government for further concessions for their own designated flag carriers providing scheduled air services to and from India if Jet Airways wanted to protect its international traffic rights from/to India. This, in turn, could lead the company's Indian-based competitors to complain to the Indian authorities that Jet Airways was not a "genuine" Indian flag carrier and might potentially result in competitors applying for the revocation of Jet Airways' operating permit and traffic rights (in India and abroad).[35]

Jet Airways Airbus A340-300 at London Heathrow Airport in 2005 with the 1993-2007 livery

[edit]British

contractor controversy

Another controversy arose when Asmin Tariq, a British contractor of Asian descent, who was working for the airline as a security agent at Heathrow Airport (and was subsequently made a member of staff when the airline decided to bring its London-based security operation in-house), became implicated in the foiled terror plot of 10 August 2006 to blow up over several weeks up to ten transatlantic airliners belonging to three different US airlines in mid-air on their way from London to New York, Newark and Los Angeles.[36] Asmin Tariq had been arrested along with the other 20+ suspects and is now[when?] in British police custody. In addition, he has been suspended from duty by Jet Airways. When asked how such a person could have been employed by the airline in a position demanding extreme confidence and trust, Jet Airways defended its conduct by saying that the person was a UK passport holder who had passed the stringent security requirements of BAA, Heathrow's owner and operator. They also said that under UK employment legislation, the company was obliged to offer any permanent appointments to former contractors once the contract that formed the basis of their original employment had been terminated. [edit]Corporate

affairs and Identity

Jet Airways's head office is located in the Siroya Centre in Andheri, Mumbai.[37] Jet Airways's head office was previously located in the S.M. Centre, a rented, unmarked six storey building in Andheri.[38][39] In 2008 Robyn Meredith ofForbes stated that the complex was "as shabby as (Jet Airways CEO Nares) Goyal's home is posh" and that the complex was "In need of a fresh coat of paint". The complex was 15 minutes driving time from Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport.[39] [edit]Subsidiaries

JetLite JetLite was a wholly owned subsidiary of Jet Airways. It was established as Sahara Airlines on 20 September 1991 and began operations on 3 December 1993 with two Boeing 737-200 aircraft. Initially services were primarily concentrated in the northern sectors of India, keeping Delhi as its base, and then operations were extended to cover all the country. Sahara Airlines was rebranded as Air Sahara on 2 October 2000. On 12 April 2007 Jet Airways took over Air Sahara and on 16 April 2007 Air Sahara was renamed as JetLite. JetLite operated a fleet of mixed owned– leased Boeing 737 Next Generation aircraft and Bombardier CRJ-200ER. JetLite ceased operations on 25 March 2012 after merger with Jet Konnect.[40] The Bombardier jets were phased out but the Boeings remained in service and operated for JetKonnect. JetLite offered a buy on board service called JetCafé,[41] offering food for purchase.

A JetKonnect ATR 72-600

JetKonnect JetKonnect is the low-cost brand of Jet Airways. It was launched on 8 May 2009.[42] It operates a fleet of Boeing 737 Next Generation aircraft. The rationale for launching Jet Konnect was to close down loss-making routes and divert the planes to more profitable routes with higher passenger load factors. Jet already ran a low-cost airline named JetLite. According to Jet Airways, the decision to launch a low-cost brand instead of expanding the existing JetLite was taken to avoid the regulatory delays associated with moving excess aircraft and assets from Jet Airways to JetLite, which have separate operating codes. Jet Konnect offers a no frills flight where meals and other refreshments have to be purchased on board. To identify if the flight is a full service or Konnect the flight numbers for Konnect are in the series 9W 2000-2999.[43] Jet Airways merged the JetLite brand into Jet Konnect on 25 March 2012.[40] Jet Airways offers eight business class seats in Konnect to cash in on Kingfisher Airlines' woes.[44] In December 2012, Jet Airways placed an order for 5 ATR 72-600 aircraft to "enhance regional connectivity." The first aircraft was delivered the same month, leased from GECAS and was operated for JetKonnect.[45]

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