Qatar Airways plans to tap India’s surging air travel market as a key linchpin to its ambitious expansion plan.
Qatar Airways currently operates 58 flights a week from Doha to nine cities in India, including daily scheduled services to Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Cochin, Trivandrum, Hyderabad and Kozhikode – the most recent which it added in mid June.
“India today is by far the largest single market for Qatar Airways with a network of nine cities which represents more than 10 per cent of our global network of 83 international routes,” said Qatar’s CEO, Akbar Al Baker.
“We are eyeing up many more opportunities in this huge market and look forward to opening up further routes to give the traveling public to and from India more choice.” The airline currently operates a fleet of 62 aircraft to 83 destinations worldwide, including the Far East and Indian subcontinent.
Kozhikode is the airline’s second route launch of 2008, following the launch of non-stop fl ights between Doha and the southern Chinese industrial city of Guangzhou launched in March. Later this year the carrier will commence scheduled flights to Houston from Doha.
Qatar will take delivery of its third B777-200 Long Range aircraft mid-way through this year, marking the start of an aggressive fleet expansion programme over the next few years with an average of one aircraft joining the airline every month.
Qatar Airways currently has outstanding orders for more than 200 aircraft worth over US$30 billion