Qatar Airways exploring alternative options for Indian airline business
Qatar Airways is reassessing its plans to launch a new airline in India, and may instead opt to collaborate with a partner in India.
It is also revisiting an option to take a stake in the country’s largest airline IndiGo, said Qatar Airways CEO Akbar al-Baker.
The review is down to India’s bewildering foreign ownership rules, he said.
"We are really very interested to launch an airline in India, but the regulation is a little bit confusing to us. We really don’t know what is allowed."
Foreign carriers are able to take 49% ownership of an India based airline.
Qatar Air had planned to establish an airline as a minority owner along with sovereign wealth fund Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) but this was rejected by Indian authorities as QIA is effectively Qatar Air’s owner.
Working with an Indian airline or taking a stake in market leader IndiGo seem the most likely routes to establishing a footprint in the world’s fastest growing aviation market, he said.
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