IndiGo Airline On Massive International Expansion Spree; Launches Flights To Africa, Central Asia

India's largest airline, IndiGo is on a massive international expansion spree as the air carrier announced direct flights to Kenya, Indonesia and Georgia in a past couple of days. With the recent announcement of direct flights to Tbilisi, Georgia, IndiGo Airline is now connected to 29 international destinations and 107th overall destination. The budget air carrier earlier announced to start direct flights to six new destinations in Africa and Central Asia, including to Nairobi, Tbilisi and Tashkent, this year. Once these routes are operational, the budget airline will be connecting a total of 32 international destinations compared to 26 before the announcement was made.

The rapid expansion plan will also make Indigo the second biggest Indian airline to operate on international routes, just behind Air India, route wise. However, passenger capacity wise, IndiGo Airline is now the largest Indian airline operating international flights. In the domestic market, the airline is still the biggest air carrier by a distant margin, with a 55 percent market share.   

Direct Flight To Africa, Central Asia

The airline is embarking on a "massive" international expansion plan as the air carrier has now announced to connect Nairobi in Kenya, Jakarta in Indonesia and Tbilisi in Georgia, with direct flights from Delhi/ Mumbai. Later, IndiGo will also add flights from Delhi to Azerbaijan, Uzebkistan, Kazakhstan and restart flight to Hong Kong. "Delhi will get connected in August to Tbilisi, Georgia & Baku, Azerbaijan and in September to Tashkent, Uzbekistan, and Almaty, Kazakhstan," IndiGo said in a release.

Codeshare With Turkish Airlines

IndiGo is strengthening its connectivity to Europe through the codeshare connections with Turkish Airlines. Currently, it offers connectivity to 33 destinations in Europe via Istanbul. "As part of the codeshare partnership with Turkish Airlines, IndiGo will soon be offering connectivity to North America, closing final regulatory approvals," said IndiGo. The airline entered codeshare with Turkish Airline to start flights to Istanbul, Turkey.

Later, they enhanced the partnership to deploy the first wide body plane on the route, a wet-leased Boeing 777. While initially the airline deployed the plane painted in the Turkish Airline livery, it was later painted to IndiGo's blue and white livery, making the brand only the third airline in India to operate a wide body plane after Air India and Vistara and only the second airline to operate a B777.

International Expansion Plan

The expansion also comes at a time when there is a rising demand for international travel from, to and via India, as well as the government's efforts to develop an international aviation hub in the country. IndiGo said it will be adding an "impressive 174 new weekly international flights between June and September 2023, including new destinations, routes, and frequencies".

"The addition of these exciting new destinations, new direct flight routes, enhanced flight frequencies, and strategic codeshare partnerships, will help us expand our footprint across four continents with Africa and Central Asia being penetrated for the first time. With this expansion in our network, we will now be directly touching 32 international destinations (up from 26), next to our 78 domestic destinations," IndiGo CEO Pieter Elbers said.