Singapore budget carrier Scoot hopes for more liberal seat agreement

The airline seems to be most pained at having to watch India’s growth story unfold from the wings, prompting it to urge for a more liberalised aviation policy.

On Sunday, Singapore Airlines’ (SIA) low-cost arm, Scoot, started its service out of Chennai, adding a sixth and only metro destination to its Indian portfolio, having moved out of Hyderabad to let its parent airline take over that route. While the budget carrier is very keen to increase its services in India, particularly its tier-II cities, it finds itself severely cramped by limited seat agreement between the governments of India and Singapore.

In an exclusive interaction with DH, the airline’s general manager - India, Brian Torrey, bemoaned, “The air service agreement is limited. Other carriers are holding the rights, so we cannot go to some markets. We cannot even expand our Chennai service, where we’ve returned after a 3-year hiatus.”

The airline seems to be most pained at having to watch India’s growth story unfold from the wings, prompting Torrey to urge for a more liberalised aviation policy. “The growth story is getting stronger. But we have to wait until there is some liberalisation to unlock those opportunities in the right order. If there was a different additional liberalisation to make use of the new airports in growing cities, I think that would be fantastic…we could have a more diverse network,” he pointed out.

Having begun its operations in India in 2016, the airline until Sunday operated 44 flights covering five destinations in the country - Amritsar, Coimbatore, Tiruchirappalli, Thiruvananthapuram and Visakhapatnam.  Of these, Amritsar is the most robust route for the airline, from where it flies five times a week (335 seats) since 2016. This is followed by Tiruchirappalli, from where it operates dual flights daily to Singapore.

Chennai was picked up not by design but due to availability, Torrey revealed. “There are some agreements between the two governments that only allow so many seat rights per week. We were presented an opportunity to take up new seat rights for daily 180 seats, so we changed plans. You don’t turn down a city like Chennai,” he said.

As one of the major metros of India, Chennai is also counted among the top three aviation markets and is a continuously growing market offering a variety of passenger profiles, he elaborated.

The airline has earlier ceded its flights out of Hyderabad to Singapore Airlines is busy ramping up its services and presently operates 96 flights per week, covering most metros.

Globally, Scoot connects 66 destinations in countries such as China, Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand, which Torrey believes is a very good fit for Indian travellers. It has clocked growth in Indian passengers on routes to China, Borneo and Sarawak. Destinations like Kota Kinabalu, Jakarta and Langkawi also hold much potential.

The airline is eyeing India’s tier-II market to grow its business after reporting a global load factor of 91.7% in the first quarter of FY24 (marking a 28% rise) alongside a revenue of  (Singapore) $7,999.8 million. It’s targeting the growing appetite in these markets for destinations beyond Singapore to North Asia, China and tier-II cities in Southeast Asia.

Torrey hinted that there are some new destinations in the works but refused to name them.

Brian Torrey, Scoot General Manager - India.