Another Indian regional airline starts up, aiming to connect the country’s Northeast

India’s remote northeast region will see another airline attempt to kickstart connectivity from October, betting on demand in small towns and far-flung corners of the world’s fastest growing aviation market.

Jettwings Airways, based in Guwahati, will start operations with two leased Embraer SA 175 aircraft and expects to operate a fleet of five small jets within a year, Chairman Sanjive Narain told reporters in New Delhi. The carrier aims to connect all the capital cities of India’s northeastern states - notorious for crashes due to its difficult terrain - and eventually fly to the rest of the country. 

Regional connectivity is crucial to taking the country’s boom in air travel to the residents in India’s tiny towns, hilly areas and islands - places with a potentially large population of first-time fliers. While the government requires domestic airlines to devote at least 10% of their capacity to remote routes, most carriers with bigger aircraft are reluctant to ramp up those operations since filling all the seats could be difficult. 

Jettwings Air will enter India’s fiercely competitive aviation industry that’s dominated by discount carrier Indigo, which has a market share close to 60%, and faces a daunting history. Regional carriers such as Air Pegasus, based in Bengaluru, Chennai-based Paramount Airways and Vijaywada-based Air Costa went bust just a few years after beginning operations. 

If the new entrant succeeds, it will further boost demand for regional jets in India where De Havilland Aircraft of Canada Ltd. has said it aims to win 80% of the small-plane market. The nation is also looking to partner with Embraer and Russia’s Sukhoi to manufacture small aircraft locally, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg News in March.

Jettwings intends to stand apart from established airlines like IndiGo and regional carrier FlyBig by introducing business class seating as well as food and priority check-in for what it will term “premium economy”, Narain said. Its aircraft will have 12 business class and 64 economy seats, he said. 

The airline is owned by the Jettwings Group of Institutes, which runs a pilot and cabin crew training school in Guwahati and has two decades of experience in the industry, Narain said.