Spicejet will finalize fleet expansion order in next three months, said Neil Mills, the airline Chief Executive Officer. Mills said that
the airline is in talks with both Airbus and Boeing and is evaluating both next generation fuel efficient variants of narrow-bodied planes
from Boeing and Airbus.
Mills said, “We are looking at the fleet for the long term. We are evaluating both Boeing 737 Max and Airbus 320 NEO.”
He refused to give details of the order size yet he said it won’t be a big order of 100 planes.
Currently, Spicejet has 36 Boeing 737s and 12 Bombardier. By 2016, Mills expects to have 50 Boeing -737s and 30 Bomardiers. Spicejet is
inducting 3 Bombardiers in December, 2012.
Spicejet still has the option to induct 15 Bombardiers within next year and a half.
Last week, CAPA's report said that Spicejet is understood to be in talks with Boeing to buy 30 to 40 Boeing 737 Max planes. He refused to
comment on that.
Mills expects that around 15 per cent of the capacity will be deployed on international routes by the end of next 2-3 years. Spicejet will be
flying to Guangzhou and Riyadh from Delhi in December, 2013. It will start another route from Trivandrum to Male. Mills said, “By the end
of this financial year, our 6 to 7 per cent of the capacity will be deployed on international routes.”
Post the announcement of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in aviation, Mills said that talks are on and they are not in a hurry to crack the
deal. Mills also added, “We are not desperate to do a deal. That is the fundamental issue. We will do a deal that makes sense for the
company and shareholders. If it takes time to get the right deal then let it be.”
Mills expect Spicejet would be most likely importing by January. Mills said, “There are two issues, we have one last bureaucratic hurdle. If
everything goes right, we should be importing the ATF by January.”
