Air India Ltd becomes member of Star Alliance

Air India Ltd has joined the Star Alliance group of carriers. The move could help enhance revenues at the loss-making state-run air carrier.
Thus, Air India has become Star Alliance’s 27^th member.
How Air India will benefit from the membership of Star Alliance?
Star Alliance membership allows Air India to share routes with the other airlines to more than 1,200 destinations, helping it to vie with Gulf carriers like Emirates, which have raised their share of long-distance flights into and out of India.
Star Alliance member’s together own a total of 4,338 aircraft and fly over 640 million passengers annually.
The membership is hoped to provide several benefits for the airline and its passengers, including an increase in Air India’s share on the India-US route by about 20% from current 13% within the first year itself.
As the India-US route is a major market for Air India, the membership would mean that its travelers flying to the US would have easier access to many more cities there as they would be able to smoothly travel on other Star Alliance member airlines flights going to America.

Month: Current Affairs - June, 2014