Jet lenders to invite fresh bids as parties are willing to revive airline

The committee of creditors (CoC) of beleaguered Jet Airways on Tuesday decided to call fresh expressions of interest (EoI) from prospective investors after two new entities expressed an interest in reviving the airline, sources privy to the matter said.
 
South America-based airline company Synergy Group was the sole bidder for the defunct airline, but it had submitted only a draft resolution plan a week ago. The deadline for filing a final resolution plan for Jet Airways ended on December 16.
 
The resolution professional (RP) of Jet Airways informed the bankruptcy tribunal on Tuesday that two more foreign investors had shown an early interest. One of them is a foreign investor from West Asia and the other one is an Indian-entity backed by a UK investor.
 
The CoC will vote on restarting the bid process on Friday and the results will be out on Saturday. A 15-day window would be given to the new investors to submit their expressions of interest and subsequently a 30-day period will be given to submit a resolution plan.
 
The RP has filed an affidavit with the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) to extend the corporate insolvency resolution process (CIRP) of Jet Airways. The 180-day CIRP period of Jet ended on December 16. According to the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, the CIRP period can be extended to another 90 days after the initial 180 days are over.      
 
However, Synergy will have to re-submit EoI as the CoC did not give it an extension to file the final resolution plan. Synergy's draft business plan had certain conditions for investing in Jet, one of them being the issue of slots in domestic market and international routes like London, Heathrow and Amsterdam.
 
Synergy also wanted clarity from the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) on the slots that Jet was allotted and if those will hold if it takes over the company.

The ministry of civil aviation (MoCA) and the Directorate General of Civil Aviation have clarified that winter allotment of slots till March 2020 has been completed, while slots for the summer schedule are still open. Only Air India has been allotted summer slots till November 2020.
 
However, MoCA has said that once they get a business plan from Synergy Group, they will then consider allocation of slots to Jet Airways.
 
The RP also informed NCLT that a representative from the Synergy Group will appear before the NCLT on December 19 to clear doubts of the tribunal. The tribunal wants to understand how serious Synergy Group is in reviving Jet Airways.