IndiGo plans to raise as much as 40b rupees ($534m) by selling new shares after the coronavirus pandemic halted air travel across the world, ravaging the cash flow of carriers. The board of the airline, operated by InterGlobe Aviation, approved raising cash by selling shares to institutional investors, it said in a statement to stock exchanges Monday. IndiGo reported a loss of 28.5b rupees in the three months through June, compared with net income of 12.03b rupees a year earlier. The carrier had also posted a loss of 8.7b rupees in the January-March quarter this year. IndiGo is burning through 300m rupees of cash every day, despite drastically reducing flights, cutting jobs and slashing salaries, CFO Aditya Pande told analysts on a post-earnings call last month. Aircraft manufacturers including Boeing and Airbus are resetting production targets as demand for new jets vanish. IndiGo is the biggest customer of Airbus’s best-selling A320neo jets. The airline is also raising 20b rupees by selling and leasing back unencumbered assets, on top of a previous plan to raise as much as 40b rupees by measures including renegotiating contract terms with suppliers, Pande said.<br/>
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Iran will not compensate Ukraine International Airlines for its plane Tehran accidentally downed in January because the passenger jet was insured by European firms, the head of Iran's Central Insurance Organisation said on Monday. "The Ukrainian plane is insured by European companies in Ukraine and not by Iranian (insurance) companies," said Gholamreza Soleimani, according to the Young Journalists Club news website affiliated with state TV. "Therefore, compensation should be paid by those European companies." Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards shot down the Ukraine International Airlines flight with a ground-to-air missile on Jan. 8 just after the plane took off from Tehran, in what Tehran later acknowledged as a “disastrous mistake” by forces who were on high alert during a confrontation with the United States. Soleimani's comments concerned the aircraft and did not address potential compensation for victims' families. There was no immediate comment from European aviation insurers.<br/>
A new mainland China-backed carrier has applied to Hong Kong’s civil aviation authority to become the city’s fifth passenger airline, in an attempt to loosen the Cathay Pacific Group’s dominance. Greater Bay Airlines is a rare newcomer in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic which has brought international air travel to a standstill, crippling the aviation industry across the world. The Civil Aviation Department confirmed that Greater Bay Airlines Company Limited’s application for an air operator’s certificate (AOC) was submitted to it last month and was being processed. It could be at least two years before the airline clears all the regulatory red tape to fly, an expert on Hong Kong aviation said. The key man behind the venture is mainland property tycoon Bill Wong Cho-bau, who has been dubbed “Shenzhen’s Li Ka-shing” after one of Hong Kong’s richest men, and already runs Shenzhen-based Donghai Airlines. The new airline is believed to be looking at operating on a low-cost model mainly with flights between China, Southeast Asia, and Northeast Asia, according to an industry source familiar with the plans. The source said the airline intended to use Boeing 737 aircraft. Donghai Airlines uses 23 older-generation 737s and has ordered 25 737 MAX aircraft.<br/>
Long-haul low-cost carrier AirAsia X carried only 2,291 passengers during the three months ended 30 June. By comparison, the Malaysian carrier had flown nearly 1.46m passengers in the same period of 2019. The average load factor on AirAsia X flights in this year’s Q2 was just 38%, down from 80% a year. Capacity, as measured in available seat-kilometres, was shrunk some 99.6%, and traffic in revenue passenger-kilometres was down 99.8%. “The company had announced the temporary hibernation of its fleet towards the end of the first quarter of 2020,” says AirAsia X. “To date, the hibernation remains in place as international borders at our destinations remain closed.” It adds: “During 2Q20, the company maintained only minimal operations in supporting repatriation of travellers as well as freight and cargo services. The total number of sectors flown on charter and cargo basis totalled up to 146 during the period."<br/>
Air Arabia slipped into a Dh169m loss for H1 2020, brought on the drastic measures taken by governments worldwide to contain the pandemic. In particular, it was Q2 that was heavily impacted. The carrier's turnover for the period registered Dh1.02b, a drop of 53% from the Dh2.17b last year. It carried a total of 2.48m passengers from all its four hubs in H1, a drop of 57% compared to H1 2019. Sheikh Abdullah Bin Mohamed Al Thani, Chairman, said: “Air Arabia started the year with strong performance... promising another year of growth and profitability. However, the unprecedent impact of COVID-19 left airlines battling the strongest challenge in its history. The full impact on airline operations was fully materialised in the second quarter as a result of border closures and flights suspension across all key markets. This fact has led airlines to focus on controlling cost while supporting global relief efforts with repatriation and aid flights”. The drop-off in Q2 numbers makes the reality all the more stark. Revenues for the April to June period was Dh120m, and leading to a yawning net loss of Dh239m. “The prospects of the global aviation industry remain strong and will continue to play a vital role in the global economic recovery," said Sheikh Abdullah. <br/>
Philippines budget carrier Cebu Pacific will increase its number of flights between Dubai and Manila to twice weekly beginning August 13, the airline announced on Monday. CEB’s Dubai-Manila flights are scheduled every Monday and Friday, while the Manila-Dubai route will be served every Sunday and Thursday. “With (the additional flight), Filipinos who are currently in the UAE can find it easier to make plans for essential travel to the Philippines,” CEB said. “In addition, CEB has also adjusted its passenger options — allowing for increased flexibility and added peace of mind, given the developing situation for air travel all over the world. These expanded flexibility options include unlimited free rebooking for new bookings (but may be subject to fare difference), rebooking fee waivers for three months of existing booking (subject to fare difference), and extension of the Travel Fund validity to two years.” <br/>
German leisure carrier TUIfly has reactivated more than half of its fleet since restarting regular flights on 15 June. The airline says it has carried around 250,000 passengers on 2,000 flights, and that 21 of its 39 Boeing 737s were back in service last month. Flights are being operated from 10 airports across Germany and Switzerland to holiday destinations within the EU. Among the most popular destinations are Spanish islands Majorca and Fuerteventura and Greek islands Crete, Kos und Rhodes, TUIfly notes. Weekly flights to Turkish destination Dalaman from Dusseldorf, Frankfurt and Hannover are scheduled to begin on 28 November. The airline says it intends to resume services to Egypt and Cape Verde as soon as government travel warnings for these locations have been lifted. “The aim is to be able to offer more than half of the originally planned capacity [for the summer 2020 schedule] in the coming months.”<br/>