Corporatetravelmaynever fullyrecover,saysSpiceJet

The aviation industry might never see a full recovery in corporate travel with some part of traffic from that segment likely to be lost forever, Chairman and Managing Director of SpiceJet Ltd Ajay Singh said today.

"In corporate travel, while some of the traffic will go away forever because of effectiveness of video communication, we still think there'll be recovery as time passes." Singh told a television channel in an interview.

"It may never recover to its full extent but there'll still be a significant recovery," he said Singh said leisure travel segment has improved but corporate travel is not picking up.

Corporate travel is likely to remain muted in the forseeable future, and this is putting pressure on yields. Leisure travel will continue to increase, he said, adding international travel depends on COVID-19 vaccination and how other countries are doing.

"When we restarted operations in May, there were 30,000 passengers on Day One for the entire sector. Yesterday (Thursday) it was 280,000. Of course, it's not about numbers alone, it's also about the yield. And the yield has been impacted because of corporate travel not returning," he said.

Singh added that all airlines need to become efficient, and must try to increase yields and not engage in "self-destructive competition".

"Costs have increased so significantly, and aviation has been one of the most impacted sectors both in India and globally. We are still hoping that the government will find some ways to assist this sector as well as travel and tourism," he added.

SpiceJet's consolidated loss narrowed to 667.75 million rupees in October-December from 1.06 bln rupees in July-September.

The company's shares closed 3.4% higher at 90.70 rupees on the National Stock Exchange on Friday.