India's full-service airline Vistara celebrated another milestone this week – expanding to a 50 aircraft strong fleet. The latest addition (an Airbus A321neo) was unveiled at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport, with some of the company's top bosses, including CEO Vinod Kannan, in attendance.

50 aircraft strong fleet

On June 9th, Vistara unveiled its latest Airbus A321neo airplane at Delhi's IGI Airport and celebrated having a 50+ aircraft fleet. The airplane, registered VT-TVE, flew in from Airbus’ Hamburg facility on June 1st and is yet to fly its first commercial flight for the airline.

Vistara, a 51:49 joint venture between India's Tata Group and Singapore Airlines, launched operations in 2015 and has carried more than 30 million passengers over the years. Now, in its eighth year of operations, it enjoys a fleet of mostly new A320 family of aircraft, two Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners, and a bunch of older Boeing 737 jets, which it plans to phase out with more aircraft coming in.

Growth story

In 2018, Vistara kick-started its major expansion plans by ordering 50 Airbus A320neo family aircraft and 6 Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners. Until then, it was already operating 21 Airbus narrowbodies for its domestic operations. The 50 aircraft deal included a letter of Intent (LoI) for 13 A320neos and an additional 37 A320neo family aircraft from lessors.

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In 2019, it picked up nine Boeing 737-800s, which previously flew for Jet Airways to provide the capacity it needed while it was awaiting its new planes. Only five of these remain in its fleet, which are on their way out, with more Airbus narrowbodies joining in.

Some of Vistara's other fleet milestones include receiving its first widebody aircraft – Boeing 787-9 – in February 2020 and its first owned Airbus A320neo (VT-TQE) in May 2021.

Even as airlines around the world halted growth during the pandemic, Vistara continued developing its fleet and network in the last two years, having received 26 airplanes since 2020, five of which have been delivered this year alone, according to ch-aviation.

Since April 2020, the airline has expanded its fleet by over 25% while significantly growing its global network to ten international destinations. With the induction of two Dreamliners, Vistara also started flying long-haul to London, Paris, Frankfurt, and for a short while, Tokyo.

Way forward

The airline's CEO, Vinod Kannan, is confident that by the end of 2023, Vistara will have 70 airplanes in its fleet. While most of these will be single-aisle Airbus aircraft, it would also include the remaining four Dreamliners from Boeing that have been delayed due to certification issues.

Earlier this year, Kannan commented on Vistara's fleet development, saying,

“There is a requirement since we are utilizing the aircraft better. Last two years, even though the fleet count increased, the utilization of aircraft was lower... so there was no need to scale up. That process has now commenced and is in full swing.”

Kannan has said that the carrier could lease widebody aircraft to meet demand until Boeing delivers the remaining Dreamliners, and that Vistara could also look towards Air India in the future for procurement of parts.

What do you think about Vistara's fleet growth over the last few years? Please let us know in the comment section below.