Virgin Atlantic has been chasing growth in India, one of the UK’s largest source markets. The airline, which touched down in Bengaluru on April 1, 2024, launching Boeing 787-9, operated daily flights between the two markets.
Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787-9 arrives at Bengaluru on April 1, 2024 (Photo Credit: Satyaki Raghunath on X)
Virgin Atlantic Announces new flights between Mumbai and London Heathrow.
Virgin Atlantic signalled its continued commitment to India this week as its new daily service to Bengaluru touched down. The airline also announced a second daily flight to Mumbai, launching in October 2024. When it launches, the airline will operate the flight with an Airbus A350-1000 aircraft. Here is the schedule of the new flight, as planned.
The new flight to Mumbai will be the airline’s fifth daily service to India. From 2025, Virgin Atlantic will offer over one million seats into India, a 350% capacity growth since 2019, making India the largest area of growth outside the United States for Virgin Atlantic.
The new flight, however, is an anticipatory move. As highlighted by Network Thoughts, BA and Virgin Atlantic operate double daily flights to Delhi from London Heathrow. From Mumbai, BA operates a double daily flight, and Virgin operates a single daily flight. These two airports are linked to the BASA agreements between India and the UK on Air Transport. With BA planning to go triple daily in Winter 2024, the quota from the UK side is already going to be topped off. So where will the permissions from this new flight come from? It is anticipated that a new agreement may be signed between India and UK on Air Transport after India’s elections are completed.
To celebrate the new services, Virgin Atlantic CEO Shai Weiss touched down in Bengaluru and addressed a media round table, where the announcement of the latest flight launch was made. Shai mentioned that there is “Infinite Demand” 
The new service launched this week will offer seamless connectivity via London Heathrow to and from destinations throughout North America, including Seattle, San Francisco, and New York JFK, with Virgin Atlantic and transatlantic joint venture partner Delta Air Lines.
Virgin Atlantic will also quadruple the number of India-based cabin crew this summer. Through GSA partner InterGlobe Air Transport, the airline will now average four Indian cabin crew on each flight.
Bottomline
Virgin Atlantic is going big in India, having launched its fourth service and now announcing the fifth one from India. It wants to compete with Air India and British Airways for those travelling to London and the US traffic. This week, the airline launched its daily operation between Bengaluru and London Heathrow, and it will launch a flight between Mumbai and London Heathrow, its second one, in October 2024.
What do you think of Virgin Atlantic’s expansion in India?
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Live the fact that Virgin have recruited the 4 Indian crew via a 3rd party rather than directly! How much of a liability would it have been to recruit them directly!
Tells you everything you need to know about how they value staff in general!