Vistara In No Hurry To Expand International Flight Operations: CEO Vinod Kannan

Vistara is in no hurry to lease B787 Dreamliner aircraft to expand international flight operations as it does not want to get stuck with a plane that cannot be used viably, its CEO Vinod Kannan said on Sunday.

For more than a year, Boeing has not delivered any B787 plane as the US Aviation regulator wants it to first make rectifications in the aircraft production line.

Vistara had ordered six B787 planes in 2018 but it has got delivery of only two of those aircraft till date.

The lack of more wide-bodied B787 aircraft has hampered the airline’s expansion of international flight operations.

Asked by when Vistara would like to have another Boeing 787 aircraft in its fleet, Kannan said, “I would like to have it yesterday. But the facts are that these things do take time.”

“When you come up with a RFP (Request For Proposal) for a new aircraft, there is certain set of considerations. When you are looking into the market for aircraft that are used, you need to be looking at different parameters – what is the age of the aircraft? What are the engines’ capacities?... It is a different set of considerations with which we have to go with our eyes open,” he noted.

Kannan was talking to reporters on the sidelines of the 78th annual general meeting of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) in Doha.

“The last thing we want is to hurry and get stuck with an aircraft that we cannot utilize viably,” he mentioned.

As much as Vistara wants to get the capacity as soon as it can, it also wants to ensure that it gets a good deal, he said.

He said the leases for B787 aircraft will hopefully be short-term with an option of increasing its duration as this is an interim lift as the airline waits for its own aircraft.