Indian budget airline SpiceJet Ltd, which has surged more than 280 percent in 2015, said it’s received interest from Gulf airlines looking to acquire a stake.
The airline is in talks with Airbus and Boeing to purchase more than 150 planes a final decision on this will be taken by the end of March 2016.
Ajay Singh is a co-founder of the airline, who bought back into the company last year after it was on the verge of a collapse by obtaining a controlling stake. The company has reported profits in the past three quarters, having made losses in the five preceding quarters. Singh now wants to more than quadruple the airline’s fleet from 41 aircraft at present.
Singh said that the company is generating enough money to pay for the order, but might also use various forms of credit financing should there be any shortfall, ruling out diluting its equity to help buy the planes.
SpiceJet also has what Singh described as a “regional aircraft business” servicing India’s smaller cities through a fleet of 14 Bombardier planes.
SpiceJet is in talks with Toronto-listed Bombardier, Brazil’s Embraer and France’s ATR to potentially buy a further fifty planes to service this sector.