Jet Airways saw an upswing in its market shares on Wednesday (March 27) after the decision to fly 40 more aircrafts were made by a top aviation ministry official. The rise in the share price is a 10-week high for the airline.
The decision by the said aviation ministry official states that no more aircrafts will be grounded for the time being and 40 aircrafts will be functional by the end of April. The number will raise the percentage of the airline’s count of functional aircrafts to 80 percent. The new developments have taken place following a funding support of nearly INR 15 billion to help out the hugely debt-ridden airline.
On the other hand, in the wake of the stepping down of Jet Airways founder and former Chairman Naresh Goyal and wife Anita Goyal earlier this week after a tug-of-war of power play with banks as well as investor in the Jet Airways company Etihad Airways, the company as well as the former chairman on Wednesday announced that the market share of Goyal will be reduced to 25 percent from 50.5 percent.
Lenders to the airline State bank of India will be taking over the company with its majority shares, management and boards under it. The lenders will soon launch a bidding process which will start from April 9 and will close on April 30. According to industry experts, Tata Sons which had previously been interested in Jet as well as Qatar Airways, whom Goyal had approached quite recently, may put in its bids as well.
Goyal who was the general sales agent for international airlines in India had launched Jet Airways as an air taxi operator in 1993. Within a few years, Jet overthrew Air India to become a strong market leader with dominant international operations. Eventually, the rising competition and the advent of low-cost carriers toppled Jet Airways from its position of dominance and left it struggling to find its footing in the airline business.
