Bance Air to operate on UK-India sector

BY A CORRESPONDENT
May 28, 2006

UK-based NRI Dave Bance is on course with plans to launch BanceAir, an airline that will directly connect certain key destinations in India to Heathrow, to cater to the burgeoning visiting friends and relatives (VFR) market in the United Kingdom as well as India. Bance has already acquired a scheduled airline license from the British civil aviation authorities, and has also obtained permission from the Indian ministry of civil aviation to fly into two Indian destinations. A decision on the third destination is pending.

Bance Air will have four leased Boeing 777s, and will be flying daily to three non-metro destinations. The VFR quotient is high in this sector, accounting for 37 per cent of India-bound UK visitors, according to data from Visitbritain.com. In comparison, business-related travellers account for 37 per cent, and holiday-related passengers account for 21 per cent of the total visitors.

The proposal is being received with some scepticism as the India-UK sector is already crowded with new air service agreements signed last year. Currently, close to two dozen airlines are operational here, including Lufthansa, KLM, Air India, Royal Jordanian, Air France, British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, SriLankan Airlines, and British Midland, as well as Jet and Air Sahara.

Bance, who was in Delhi recently, has refused to name the non-metro destinations, only saying, "We are projecting a 70 per cent load factor on our flights and we will have only two class configurations of business and economy." He added, "A lot of British Asians often waste a lot of time reaching directly to their home-towns in India. I plan to make their journey a bit less tedious by connecting direct flights to these select destinations."

Most UK flights connect to Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai and Kolkata. Some cities like Amritsar and Ahmedabad are also emerging as lucrative destinations for aerial operations.

The Bance Group is worth 70 million pounds and is involved in manufacturing, real estate and hotel investment, as well as IT and telecommunications, the film business and the music industry.