Jet Airways Expected To Take Airbus A320neos Not Delivered To S7
An Airbus A320neo aircraft is creating a significant buzz on social media and aviation websites for its paint job. While most Indians are familiar with its livery, nobody can claim to have seen it on an A320. The aircraft in question is an Airbus narrowbody sporting colors of soon-to-be-launched Jet Airways, further fueling long-standing speculation that the airline could look towards Airbus narrowbodies for its aircraft needs this time around.
A320 in Jet Airways' livery
Images of an A320 airplane in Jet Airways livery are actively being circulated on social media. The aircraft is said to have rolled out after a fresh paint job, keeping all speculation alive that the airline will have Airbus narrowbodies in its fleet.
Earlier this year, it was reported that Jet Airways is in talks with plane manufacturers and lessors to add up to 8 planes before 2023. Usually, there's always a long waiting line for popular narrowbody aircraft such as the Airbus A320 and Boeing 737, but Jet was said to be eying the planes which were to be delivered to Russian carriers before the Ukraine war.
A new sight
At its peak, Jet Airways operated a mixed fleet of Boeing 737, ATR turboprop, Airbus A330, and Boeing 777 airplanes. But it was the 737, which shouldered the bulk of its operations and defined the airline's brand for the millions of passengers who flew the carrier over the years.
And now, to see the same colors (with minor differences) on an A320 is a sight many Indians, particularly av-geeks, will take some time to get used to.
Pilot hiring for the type
One of the first clues about Jet considering the A320 was when it posted a message on Twitter in July, inviting applications for current and type-rated pilots on the Airbus A320, Boeing 737NG, or the 737 MAX aircraft.
The carrier is yet to announce any official order for aircraft, but rumor has it that it is close to finalizing a deal to buy 50 A220 jets from Airbus. But until an order is finalized, Jet will likely get a handful of leased airplanes for its immediate needs until it settles for a more uniform fleet later.
S7 Airlines (S7, Novosibirsk) has confirmed plans to create a low-cost carrier by spring 2022 and will order twenty-four new Airbus aircraft for the purpose by 2024, local media quoted the chairman of the airline’s board of directors, Tatiana Fileva, as saying on July 28.
Fileva had already revealed last week that Siberia-based S7 Group, Russia’s largest private aviation holding, would create a new budget airline for regional traffic, aiming to carry more than 7 million passengers by 2024.
At a press conference on the morning of July 28, she said that the new airline’s fleet will consist of A320-200neo and an agreement had been signed on the delivery of the first four aircraft of the type, the newspaper Kommersant and RBC News reported.
The fleet will grow to six to eight leased aircraft in the first three years of operation and more than 20 by 2024. Tickets will go on sale on April 1, 2022, and flight operations will commence in July 2022.
The group’s own investment in the project in its first stage - it will not be seeking loans - will total RUB2.5 billion to RUB3 billion rubles (USD34-41 million), Fileva said, with a return on investment after four years. She expects the carrier will be able to obtain Russian state subsidies under a programme supporting regional airlines.
The network will focus on point-to-point routes linking regions mainly within central Russia, bypassing Moscow. It aims to carry about 1 million passengers in its first year of operation and 6-7 million from 2024.
According to Fileva, also an S7 Group shareholder, the segment of interregional transportation is where the company sees the most potential - a market “which we cannot cover within the framework of the current S7 Airlines business model.” The route networks of Europe’s low-cost carriers also tend to connect regions, she noted.
“We will now start negotiating with the airports,” she said.
She declined to name specific routes but said that key cities where the company currently sees demand include Omsk, Chelyabinsk, and Kazan Int'l. The name and brand of the new airline will be presented separately and it will exist as a separate entity from S7, not as a subsidiary. Fileva named Grigory Davydov, currently S7 Airlines’ director of strategy, as the start-up’s general director.
In early May, sources told the business daily Vedomosti that S7 Group was considering setting up a new LCC, claiming that the new carrier may be created on the basis of former wholly-S7-owned production carrier Globus (GH, Novosibirsk), which completed its merger into S7 by December 2019. Fileva confirmed this idea. Russia’s civil aviation regulator (Rosaviatsia) cancelled Globus’ air operator’s certificate (AOC) in November 2020. Now it will be restored, she said.
At the moment, Russia’s only budget carrier is Aeroflot Group unit Pobeda (DP, Moscow Vnukovo), which operates a fleet of forty-four leased B737-800s. However, in April, transport minister Vitaly Savelyev - who was chief executive of Aeroflot Group before becoming minister in November 2020 - told reporters that his ministry was “negotiating” the creation of another airline, a low-cost one.
S7 Airlines Expected To Order 24 A320neo Aircraft By 2024
Russia’s S7 Airlines has indicated that it plans to order 24 new Airbus A320neo planes by 2024. When speaking to the press earlier today, S7 Airlines Chairman of the Board Tatiana Fileva said she wanted to create a new Russian low-cost carrier.
S7 Airlines wants to create a new Russian LCC. Photo: Getty Images
A new low-cost airline for Russia
As announced today, S7 is looking to form a new low-cost airline for Russia, flying point-to-point routes and connecting regional airports. The group hopes to launch the new airline in July 2022, with a focus on bypassing Moscow. Tatiana Fileva, Chairman of the Board of Directors of S7, said at the press conference (as reported by RBC),
“These will be inter-regional flights, bypassing Moscow. We will now negotiate with the airports.”
Fileva has high hopes for the new low-cost airline, eyeing carrying 7.8 million passengers by the year 2024. In just the first year of operations, the new airline is anticipated to carry as many as a million passengers. Investment in the project is anticipated to reach around 2.5 – 3 billion rubles ($34 – $40 million).
The airline will operate all A320neo family aircraft, with the backbone of the company formed from the ever-popular A321neo. The high capacity, high-efficiency Airbus has proven to be a key aircraft for low-cost operators in Europe, and it could work well in Russia. Fileva says that the first leased aircraft have already been secured and that, by 2024, it will fly a fleet of 24 neo jets.
Does Russia need another low-cost carrier?
Depsite the size of the country, Russia is actually woefully lacking in low-cost airlines. In fact, Pobeda is the only true low-cost airline in Russia’s domestic market. It therefore operates 100% of Russia’s domestic low-cost capacity, and around 40% of the international low-cost traffic, according to CAPA.
Pobeda is Russia’s only true LCC. Photo: Getty Images
Russia remains incredibly underpenetrated by air travel, with around 0.69 trips per person in 2018 compared to 3.73 in the UK and 2.5 in the US. Price sensitivity is a major factor in this, and more low-cost competition would be a positive outcome for the country.
Fileva notes that the income of the population in Russia is not growing. As such, lower-cost options are a high priority to get people traveling more frequently. While existing airlines have lowered prices over the course of the pandemic, with many operating an almost hybrid model, there’s still much scope for a home-grown LCC to succeed.
Born from the ashes of Globus
The new airline will not be a child of the S7 airline; rather, Fileva says that it will be a standalone enterprise and a part of the group. S7 Strategy Director Grigory Davydov is earmarked to be placed in charge of this new carrier.
The new airline will be formed from the remnants of former Russian airline Globus. Globus Airlines was founded in 2008 by S7 Airlines and operated with Tupolev Tu-154M initially. Later, it acquired 737s, even taking delivery of a couple of 737 MAX 8s, before it was shut down and absorbed into the main S7 airline.
S7 intends to apply for a new operator’s certificate under Globus, but assets that the carrier will be rebranded. There is no word yet on what the airline will be called, but it is hoped that things will become clear by the end of this year.
About S7 Airlines
Created in the Soviet Union as an airline in 1957, S7 was originally called Siberia Airlines. In 1997 the airline tried to buy the now-defunct Vnukovo Airlines to create a hub at Moscow’s Vnukovo International Airport (VKO). In 2005 Natalia Fileva decided to rebrand Siberia Airliners as S7 Airlines following the Chechen suicide bombing of Siberia Airlines Flight 1047 in the late summer of 2004.
Since the rebranding, S7 continued to grow, joining the oneworld airline alliance in 2010. Today S7 Airlines is the largest domestic airline in Russia, with its main bases at Moscow’s Domodedovo International Airport (DME) and Tolmachevo Airport (OVB) in Russia’s third-largest city Novosibirsk. According to the aviation data and statistics website ch-aviation, S7 Airlines has a fleet of 103 aircraft comprised of the following planes:
"The new Airbus A321neo aircraft will enable us to increase capacity on long-distance flights within Russia as well as offer our passengers new international routes,” Vladimir Obyedkov, the CEO of S7 Airlines, said.
S7 Airlines is an existing A320neo Family operator with six A320neo currently in service alongside seven A321ceo. It also operates eighteen A319-100s, eighteen A320ceo, and seventeen B737-800s (operated by its Globus (GH, Novosibirsk) subsidiary).
S7 Airlines (S7, Novosibirsk) has signed an agreement with SMBC Aviation Capital for the lease of six A320neo aircraft. According to a lessor statement, the Pratt & Whitney-powered aircraft will be sourced from its Airbus order book and will be placed with the Russian carrier from 2020.
SMBC Aviation Capital has worked with S7 Airlines since 2013. With this new deal, their cooperation will increase to thirteen leased aircraft.
According to the ch-aviation fleets module, S7 Airlines currently operates four A320neo of which three are leased from AerCap (and its Whitney Leasing unit) while the other one is leased from BOC Aviation.
