The Tata Group has not been sitting quietly, waiting for their new CEO to arrive at Air India. A lot of small tweaks are already underway. And some big housekeeping items such as consolidation of its airline portfolio as well. The first off the mark was AirAsia India, which is already owned majorly by the group.

Air India gets approval from the Indian regulator to combine AirAsia India with itself.

In April 2022, Air India filed a request with the Competition Commission of India (CCI), India’s anti-trust regulator, to acquire its entire shareholding in AirAsia India. This request has now been approved, as per a tweet from CCI today.

CCI approves acquisition of entire shareholding in Air Asia India by Air India, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Tata Sons pic.twitter.com/TqUE8kFiYC

— CCI (@CCI_India) June 14, 2022

While it is not clear at the moment if Air India will subsume the operations of AirAsia India into its own, or operate it as a subsidiary, for the time being, the combined entity will have a 15.7 per cent share in India’s domestic passenger market. Air India Express, the other subsidiary of Air India, does not fly domestically, apart from a couple of tag flights here and there.

The Tata Group had raised their stake in AirAsia India to 83.67% in December 2020, and after this approval will also acquire the rest from AirAsia Berhad to become the 100% owner.

Bottomline

Air India has received regulatory approval from India’s anti-trust regulator to acquire 100% of AirAsia India. This means that India will see more airlines consolidation in the coming days, with one brand name change included.

What do you think will be the transaction path for Air India to acquire AirAsia India?

---

Liked our articles and our efforts? Please pay an amount you are comfortable with; an amount you believe is the fair price for the content you have consumed. Please enter an amount in the box below and click on the button to pay; you can use Netbanking, Debit/Credit Cards, UPI, QR codes, or any Wallet to pay. Every contribution helps cover the cost of the content generated for your benefit.

(Important: to receive confirmation and details of your transaction, please enter a valid email address in the pop-up form that will appear after you click the ‘Pay Now’ button. For international transactions, use Paypal to process the transaction.)

We are not putting our articles behind any paywall where you are asked to pay before you read an article. We are asking you to pay after you have read the article if you are satisfied with the quality and our efforts.