Air France-KLM, Virgin Atlantic and Delta have been increasing their presence in India ever since Jet Airways shut a few weeks ago. Jet Airways was a key partner for the Air France/KLM/Delta/Virgin Atlantic joint venture, bringing traffic from India to their hubs in Paris/Amsterdam/London, from where the other carriers would pick up the transatlantic leg for North America, mostly the USA.

KLM is advancing the debut of the Boeing 787-10 on Indian routes as well as adding capacity from Amsterdam to Delhi. KLM is also gradually increasing its flights on Mumbai – Amsterdam route to daily. Apart from this, KLM announced the launch of 3x weekly Bangalore – Amsterdam route with a 787-9.

KLM’s 3x weekly Bangalore – Amsterdam route which goes live on October 28, 2019, went on sale earlier this week. The schedule for the flight is,

KL879 AMS1105 – 0050(+1 day)BLR 789 135
KL880 BLR0245 – 0820AMS 789 246

A roundtrip economy class ticket starts at INR 39k.

A roundtrip business class ticket starts at INR 158k.

KLM’s 787-9 feature 30 business class seats, 48 economy comfort seats and 216 economy class seats. The 787-9 has Zodiac Cirrus reverse herringbone business class seats in a 1-2-1 configuration. Economy class seats are in a standard 3-3-3 configuration. Economy comfort seats are economy seats with an increased seat pitch of 35 inches as opposed to 31 inches on economy class.

Virgin Atlantic is re-launching daily flights on Mumbai – London Heathrow route. The new flights between London Heathrow and Mumbai will launch on October 27, 2019, when the Winter Schedule sets in.

The schedule of the new flight is as follows

VS354 LHR1015 – 0040(+1) BOM 789 D
VS355 BOM0255 – 0735LHR 789 D

A roundtrip economy class ticket starts at INR 70k. A roundtrip premium economy starts at INR 102k and a roundtrip business class ticket starts at INR 174k.

Virgin Atlantic’s 787-9 feature 31 upper-class seats, 35 premium economy seats and 195 economy class seats. Upper-class seats are in a 1-1-1 herringbone configuration. Premium economy seats are in a 2-3-2 configuration whereas economy class seats are in a standard 3-3-3 configuration.

Both flights are targetted for onward connections to the USA on their own network as well as on their partner’s, Delta.

Will you book one of the new flights? Which one of these airlines will become your preferred mode to fly to North American then?