Opportunities Today :- January 2006 Issue

AMEY AMLADI - The Regional Sales Manager for Austrian Airlines for Western and Southern India .

 

 Amey Amladi shares his views on the challenges he faces in promoting Austrian Airlines and the future strategies to focus on specific segments of travellers.

What are your responsibilities as the Sales Manager for Western and Southern India?
I look after Western and Southern India as well as parts of Central India which primarily covers Indore and Bhopal. My main objective is to achieve the revenue targets for the year. 


What were the challenges you faced when Austrian Airlines started from Mumbai?
We started operations from Mumbai in September and we were in fact one of the last players to enter the market as there was BMI, Virgin and then there was also Jet Airways flying into London. So things weren't very easy at the start and we had to push our way through.

 

We came out with certain innovative ideas to penetrate the market by segmenting ourselves in a different way. We were fairly successful and in the first week of our launch we had almost 95% load factor and we ended the first month of operations from Mumbai with 85% load factor with entire 100 per cent INR revenue and this was indeed creditable especially as our launch was not during the peak outbound travel season. 

Even November and December we achieved around 75% and 65% load factor which is commendable especially as it is the winter season in Europe. We are glad to have done pretty well in the last quarter of 2005 and we will strive hard to retain the momentum in the first quarter of 2006. 

What is the current configuration of the aircraft out of India and what are your strategies to increase the load factor?
We operate Boeing767 out of Mumbai and Delhi and we have a configuration of 36 business class and 209 economy. We are planning to refurbish our business class which should happen by mid of next year where we would offer flat beds to our business class traveller. Currently we have a seat pitch of 135. Austrian Airlines is well known for its service and we not only cater to Indian meals but also Jain meals as we cater to a large


segment of Gujarati and Marwari travellers and they have widely appreciated the cuisine options available on flight. The Business Class travel is primarily for our Corporate clients and we have tied up with various Corporate firms and this helps to get our front end market going. My real challenge is to fill in the leaner months with group movements as in the peak months there is bound to be a large number of FIT travellers and our objective is to get as many FIT travellers as it helps us get a higher yield at the end of the day. We are also targeting Diamond merchants as we have excellent connectivity to places like Brussels. We are also going to work in close liason with Tourism Boards. We had sponsored the events of Festa Italiana which was held in November and we are also making efforts in highlighting tourism to Central and Eastern Europe.

Our network is very strong within Europe and that is one of our stronger USPs. The sort of connections especially to Central and Eastern Europe are excellent with midnight departures out of Mumbai and by 0900 hours of the following day you could be in one of the cities of either Eastern or Central Europe. Currently we are looking at sectors beyond Vienna especially during the lean period and also for further connectivity into USA.


We fly into New York and Washington as well as into Canada. So we are looking at the IT sector movement especially from the South of India - from places like Bangalore and Hyderabad. We are also looking at the seasonal traffic of students especially to U.K. and USA. We also have been tapping the Trade Fair movements and have tied up with Trade Fair Operators to give them convenient connections for their clients to cities where the Trade Fairs are being held in Europe. Besides students and the trade fair movements we also cater to the Seamen traffic as the Seamen traffic is very strong out of Mumbai and the movement is on round the year basis.

When we look at competition, it is indeed hotting up. However, there is lot of potential and demand out of India and as long as it continues to grow the competition should be healthy enough. Whenever we sell a fare to Europe we sell a 4 coupon which could either be a Mumbai-Vienna-Frankfurt-Vienna- Mumbai or alternatively one could fly Mumbai-Vienna then a surface to London and thereafter from London to Vienna and back to Mumbai. So when we offer a 4 coupon ticket, the competition from LCC within Europe would not really matter as firstly the passengers get a full service carrier and the difference in the cost would be almost negligible as they are getting a 4 coupon option and rest of the sectors the FIT traveller would normally prefer using Eurail.
 

How has your experience been as prior to Austrian Airlines you were with Cathay Pacific?

My role has not really changed to a great extend. Earlier I was promoting more of the Eastbound travel and now it is Westbound and across the Atlantic as well. However, the agents that I deal with remain the same. It has been a wonderful learning experience and I am really enjoying what I am doing. The competition is stiff as airlines are expanding all the time, increasing frequencies and so on. In our case the bottom line is service and how well we can cater to our travellers. Being part of the Star Alliance also has its advantages as it gives us excellent connectivity across the globe and I am pretty optimistic that the coming year will see tremendous growth and increase in our load factor especially by the time we hit the peak tourist season in April.