Talking to BloombergQuint Emirates’ chief operating officer (COO), Adel Ahmad Al Redha, said that the airline is not planning to bid for the national carrier Air India as there are difficulties to entering India.
“As far as investment (in Air India) is concerned, there’s nothing yet on the table,” he said, adding that the middle-eastern airline lacks the management bandwidth to go out of its “comfort zone”.
He also said that there were positive trends in traffic movement in the last two months and that no drop in traffic was recorded despite the escalations in the middle east.
CCO Echoes Sentiment
The airline’s chief commercial officer, Adnan Kazim, also echoed the same sentiments, saying that Emirates wasn’t looking for equity partnerships in India.
“The time you enter equities (overseas) you tend to go away from your home comfort zone that you have in terms of policies that you have and so many other things that today you have control over.”Adnan Kazim, CCO, Emirates
He added that Emirates’ strategy is to focus on their home country where it has more control.
Kazim also lamented the restricted bilateral ties between the UAE and India saying that opening up of the bilateral agreement will benefit both the nations. “We’re sitting on restricted bilateral (ties). This restriction that we live with, unfortunately, is hitting even the Indian carriers,” he said.
There’s a “bottleneck situation” at India’s core airports, he said, adding that the country needs to give access to its regional airports to enhance capacity.
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