Flights between India, Europe to increase; route profitability remains challenge: Air France-KLM

Air France-KLM will increase its passenger-carrying capacity between India and Europe by more than 25 per cent from this winter even as profitability remains one of the biggest challenges for its flights on this route, a senior executive of the airline said.

"One of the major challenges in India is the route profitability. From a historical point of view, it has always been a bit of challenge. Our flights are doing well. But the economical performance is always a bit of a concern,"Welmer Blom, the senior vice-president (Middle East, Gulf and India),AirFranceKLM, told PTI.

He said India is a "strategic" market for airlines and the conglomerate would be expanding flight connectivity between Europe an India.

Jean-Noel Rault, the general manager (Indian sub-continent), Air FranceKLM, said,"If you ask about the commitment of Air France-KLM to the Indian market, as of winter, on the yearly basis, it would be over a million seats to India. Currently, we are over 800,000 seats. It would be over 25 per cent increase."
Blom told PTI, "Jet Airways was our Indian partner to expand into this strategic market. Unfortunately, the things have turned quite different than anybody expected. So, that is why we are increasing our capacity that much."
When asked if Air France-KLM is looking for any other airline partner now in India, Blom said, "If there are opportunities in the market, we will access them and see if there are possibilities."
Talking about this campaign, Blom said, "We say that fly responsibly because the aviation industry is growing fast. It is a polluting industry so we need to join efforts in the aviation industry to reduce the (carbon) footprint and that is why we have said we want to be the leader in the sustainability."