Daybreak - Air India needs saving. Singapore Airlines is playing saviour

Episode Date: October 18, 2026

Air India's recent losses nearly doubled to 22,000 cr rs, and Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran keeps showing up at its Delhi Headquarters.Singapore Airlines, which owns over 25%, is inclined to put in more cash, but in return, it wants more control over operations, costs, safety and training. And it's already changing the way pilots, engineers and cabin crew work. Meanwhile, Air India's troubles lie somewhat out of its hands. Pakistan's airspace closure hit it the hardest, and compounding its now longer routes for certain flights are soaring fuel prices. There's also delayed deliveries of new aircrafts. And of course, the reputational damage from 2025 Ahmedabad crash. Singapore Airlines' is definitely the best chance for the company's turnaround.Tune in. Listen: The Government sold Air India to escape its problems. The fix is to buy back inThis episode is edited by Arnav PrakashDaybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

N. Chandr Sheikeren, the chairman of Tata Sons, has visited Air India's Delhi headquarters about half a dozen times this year. And he's a busy man. Considering all the boardroom drama, his running feud with Noel Tata, the chief of Tata Trust has stirred up. An airline executive told my colleague Nuha that the visits show exactly how much Air India matters to Tata, not just commercially or financially, but as a brand. He told her that Air India is the show horse. It's a horse that's getting very expensive to keep. In the last financial year, Air India's consolidated losses widened to $22,000 crore from 10,900 crore the year before. That's yet another blow for a carrier that has already been battered by the crash in Amdabad

and a string of aircraft safety and pilot discipline incidents. So it makes sense that Chandrashikeren is. is worried. And so is Singapore Airlines. The state-backed South East Station Airline became a shareholder in Air India in November 2024 when it agreed with Tata Sands to merge with Stara into Air India, taking a 25.1% stake. It's only a minority owner, but it's still putting in serious cash and effort to turn the airline around. Already, Singapore Airline has booked operating losses of nearly $800 million over its two years of investment. And now it has been asked to provide a big chunk of the $1.5 billion in fresh equity that Air India wants.

Singapore Airlines is inclined to say yes, but with strings attached. This time, it wants greater control over operations, costs, safety and training. The Air India Executive told us that the expectation is very clear. budget remains sacrosanct, timelines are sacrosanct, and whatever it does must stay within those constraints. Singapore Airlines has already made a start. It is helping train cabin crew for Air India's new Boeing 7879s, a model Singapore airline also uses to improve customer experience. It's also overhauling Air India's engineering and maintenance operations with a plan to open a new facility as well. It's even getting involved in pilot training and management.

Tata is on board. But Air India's employees are less so. They are not happy with the change in work culture so far. But it's time for them to get with the plan. Because whether they like it or not, Singapore Airlines is taking command of the Air India Turnaround story. Welcome to Daybreak, a business podcast from the Ken. I'm your host, Richard Ruggies,

and every day of the week, My co-host, Nikas Shram and I will bring you one news story that is worth understanding and worth your time. Today is Monday, the 19th of October. When you start a transformation project, it's not a linear journey. You realize, okay, we need more experts. Where do we find more experts? Singapore Airlines. So, they're getting more involved.

That's what the executive I mentioned earlier told Noha. Take engineering and maintenance, for instance. Air India has now brought it in-house and new engineers are training at Air India's own academy. A new repair and overhaul facility is also planned in Manglore, reducing Air India's reliance on outside vendors like Honeywell, Technic and Panasonic avionics. What helps is that Air India's head of engineering and maintenance, Jeremy Yu, is a Singapore Airlines veteran. Then there's pilot training. It's currently instructing about 2,000 pilots. and cabin crew in Gurgao with another centre opening in Amravati, Maharashtra.

An Air India commander told Noha that six months ago, Singapore Airlines even brought in an Airbus expert from France to assess the training program. The verdict? Many instructors fell short of the required standards and were demoted. This included type-rating instructors, who are certified instructors authorized to train pilots on a specific aircraft model and line training captain. basically experience captains with more qualifications who train and supervise type-rated pilots. Not just that.

Singapore Airlines is also tightening the belt for pilots. They are now required to do their own laundry and stay in cheaper accommodations when they travel, which are leaving many of them unhappy with the management. A second executive explained to us that when cost reduction plans were being put into motion, the biggest cost ended up being sending the crew and bringing them back.

So, the company could either put them in shared rooms or downgrade their hotel type. In fact, on a recent Delhi-Riyadh flight, cabin crew shared rooms and pilots stayed in a four-star hotel instead of a five-star one. The executive claimed that the scrutiny of expenses had definitely increased, making the carrier stricter than they used to be two years ago. And the timing isn't entirely a coincidence. Air India's new CEO, Thivolde Gubramariam, has a mandate to cut costs and rebuild the airline's reputation. He seems like a good fit because he previously led Ethiopian airlines into Africa's largest and most profitable carrier.

And at his first town hall last month, he said that the mandate is now to minimize cost while not compromising on safety. The first executive we mentioned told us that every project is now judged on what it will be. burn against what it will return. They told us that a cause-centric mindset is being knitted into the organization. And that is for good reason. Air India had been losing money

for years before Tata Sons bought it back from the government in 2022, nine decades after launching it. I had done an episode on their latest losses just last month and I've linked it in the show notes below if you want to give it a listen. Now, as I was saying,

Air India definitely needs to save every rupee it can. The airline's financial situation has only gotten worse since then because of a web of geopolitical crises. More on this in the next segment. In April 2025, Pakistan closed its airspace to Indian carriers. Air India was hit the hardest.

It used that airspace the most, mainly for flights to Europe and the US. The first executive explained that Air India now has to take a longer route than its competitors. When Air France, for example, flies from Delhi to Paris, it flies over Pakistan. Air India, on the other hand, has to take a detour over the Arabian Sea. So, while Air France takes about 7,000 kilometres to reach the same destination,

Air India has to fly 8,500. A longer flight means more fuel, which is typically about 40% of an airline's cost, and that makes running the line more expensive. Of course, Air India can. can't pass that cost onto customers without losing them to competitors. So it takes the hit. Add to that, soaring jet fuel prices, largely because of the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran, and that makes the whole situation a lot worse. The closure also meant that the line could no longer have direct flights to North America.

So planes now have to stop in Europe to refuel, adding journey time, fuel burn and cost. In fact, Air India has lost an estimate. 5,500 crore rupees to the ban and fuel prices, forcing it to cut flights to Canada and the US, including the popular one that goes from Bangalore to San Francisco. And Akasa Air Executive told Noha that the fix for this issue is using more fuel-efficient aircrafts like the Airbus 350 and Boeing 787, adjusting routes, focusing on higher-paying passengers and cargo, and taking shorter parts, possibly through China. But none of this is easily done.

Take aircrafts. Air India ordered 600 of them from Boeing and Airbus in 2023. It was promised 50 to 60 by November that year, but as of September 2026, it had received only 60. A company official told again that most of what has happened over the past year to the airline has been out of its hands. Adding to all of this is the Amdabad disaster, which killed 260 people in June 2020.

The first executive said that the reputational effect of the crash hurt revenues. He said, and I quote, whenever an incident like that happens, people lose confidence in the airline. It takes time to build that again. And that's where Singapore Airlines, with its exemplary safety record, comes in handy. Akshadagal, an aviation strategy consultant,

said that Singapore Airlines is good at the things Air India lacks. And this time, it also, has the motivation to deliver. Stay tuned. So why is Singapore Airlines this motivated? The first Air India executive told us that Singapore Airlines is actually facing a lot of fire in its parliament over the investment.

And that puts pressure on everyone to do good. Like, for example, finding solutions for the delayed delivery of a new aircraft. The plan now is to retrofit older aircrafts, like the 26 Boeing 787s, Air India already has. The second executive told us that these aircrafts still have old seats, old systems and old cabins.

And because that doesn't offer the customer experience the line is aiming for now, it's putting in new seats and carpets and going for a modern layout with the business, premium economy and economy classes. The executive called it a big challenge and told us that retrofitting and aircraft is a huge project. Because retrofitting also means sourcing materials from many specialized vendors, and that's actually been quite hard since the pandemic disrupted supply chains. These supply chain issues are also the same thing that has been delaying the big aircraft order I mentioned before. Then there's the crew. Air India is competing for talent not just with Indigo and Akasa, but also

with Middle Eastern and Southwest Asian carriers that are reputed to offer better pay and perks. That's one reason why Air India is asking for more cash. But Agarwal, the aviation consultant, told us that even the expected $375 million from Singapore Airlines might only be a short-term fix. In the longer run, it would not be feasible for the investor to keep pumping in cash. And at that point, Air India will have to solve its problems, especially the cash one, on its own. One idea is already being pushed. a merger with Air India Express, which is its low-cost carrier.

Though Agarwal is skeptical about that solution. He told us that the Air India and Vistara merger worked because both of them were full-service carriers. Low-cost carriers work very differently on the basis of everything from the background IT and tech to ground staff and service. Multiple Air India officials told Noha that Singapore Airlines is not on board with this idea either.

It runs its own low-cost carrier called Scoot as a separate entity. And the Akasa executive said that the company is more into business class and premium travel and does not want to mix the two models. So what does Singapore Airlines want to do with Air India? Well, the list is long. It wants to refine network planning, international connectivity, aircraft utilization, customer experience, operational and engineering processes, safety and reliability standards,

and revenue management. Of course, it would be in Air India's best interests to listen to it. Because, as the Akasa executive put it, ultimately only they can do a turnaround for Air India. No one else. Daybreak is produced from the Newsroom of the Ken India's first subscriber-focused business news platform. What you're listening to is just a small sample of a subscriber-only offerings

and a full subscription unlocks daily, long-form feature stories, newsletters and podcasts. Head to the can.com and click on the red subscribe button on the top of the website. Today's episode was hosted and produced by me, Rachel Wirtkes and edited by Arna Prakash.