Adani Group, CEO Gautam Adani, relocating one of the airlines of Adani Airport, from Mumbai airport to Navi Mumbai airport and is trying to increase revenue from its eight airports by increasing the airport commercial area three times, creating multiplexes and Legoland theme parks in the city side.
The Adani Group, headed by billionaire Gautam Adani, is actively investigating a 200 per cent increase in the airport’s commercial space, as well as the construction of multiplexes and Legoland theme parks on the city side. More crucially, it intends to relocate one of the major airlines to Navi Mumbai airport to decongest Mumbai airport and increase revenue from its eight airports.
Adani Group officials said in a presentation to investors that Navi Mumbai airport will open by the end of 2024 and that the move will decongest Mumbai airport, India’s second busiest, which has no expanding capacity due to its central location.
Adani Airport Holdings (AAHL), a subsidiary of Adani Group owned by Gautam Adani, manages airports in Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Mangalore, Jaipur, Guwahati, and Thiruvananthapuram.
Adani Airport Holdings took over management control of Mumbai International Airport Limited (MIAL) from the GVK Group last year in July 2021. This follows permissions from the Government of India, the Maharashtra City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO), and the Maharashtra Government. With his acquisition, the Adani Group aims to connect tier 1 cities with tier 2 and tier 3 cities in order to build a hub and spoke model for its airport portfolio.
MIAL is India’s second busiest airport in terms of both passenger and cargo traffic. With eight airports under management and expansion, AAHL is now India’s largest airport infrastructure business, responsible for 25% of airport footfalls. With the advent of MIAL, AAHL now controls 33% of India’s air freight traffic.
The financial daily, citing one of the presentations, stated that Mumbai airport is the second busiest in the country and that there is no room for capacity development beyond 6 crore passengers per year due to its location in the centre of the city. This practically means that there are no additional slots available for airlines at Mumbai airport. According to the Adani Group presentation, the Mumbai airport has two major carriers with domestic and international flights—IndiGo and Air India.
One of these airlines may be relocated to Navi Mumbai International Airport to decrease the burden on Mumbai International Airport (MIAL). The airline will profit from good slots at the Navi Mumbai airport. The cost of relocating the entire base from Mumbai to Navi Mumbai is not prohibitively expensive, although shifting just spillover will incur an additional initial setup cost for the airline.
Currently, Mumbai airport handles 2,573 weekly flights, 919 of which are operated by IndiGo and 390 by Air India. According to data from aviation analysis firm Sirium, Vistara and Go First are ranked third and fourth, with 364 and 243 flights, respectively.
In the second presentation, the Adani group stated that it intends to raise passenger capacity at the seven operational airports from Rs 3.1 Crores to Rs 7.5 Crores by 2027. Furthermore, the Navi Mumbai airport would be operational in the first phase by December 2024, with a capacity of 2 crore passengers. It also intends to develop Mumbai airport as a transit centre, similar to Dubai airport. The expansion of Adani Airport Holdings strengthens the management structure of the corporation’s airport activities.
The Adani Group has hired Arun Bansal as CEO of Adani Airport Holdings Ltd, an affiliate of Adani Enterprises Ltd that controls the conglomerate’s airport operations. Bansal had joined Adani Group from Ericsson, where he was senior vice president and market area head for Europe and Latin America.
R.K. Jain, Non-Aero, will be the chief executive officer of airport operations, while Harshad Jain will remain the executive officer. B. V. J. K. Sharma will continue to be the CEO of Navi Mumbai International Airport, and Prakash Tulsiani will be the CEO of Mumbai International Airport Ltd.
