With "structural tailwinds", Air India will expand its international operations, optimise networks as well as tap premiumisation-led growth in the 2026-27 financial year, a senior airline executive said on Friday.

Describing FY27 as a "conversion year", Air India Chief Commercial Officer Nipun Aggarwal said the airline would have a credible product foundation to compete for premium share across key markets.

Tata Group-owned loss-making Air India is in the midst of an ambitious turnaround journey as part of which it is upgrading fleet, adding new aircraft and improving services.

Emphasising that product alone will not determine FY27 for Air India, Aggarwal said the differentiating factors will be reliability of the schedule, on-time performance and the way it handles disruptions.

FY27 is not about recovery and it is about acceleration, he said and added that the year would be about returning to the growth trajectory that has defined Air India since privatisation.

"In FY26, there was a surge in disruptions, misconnections, and flight changes which has dented the confidence of customers, especially corporate clients who measure airlines by such reliability and it is critical that we rebuild this confidence," he said in a message to the staff on Friday.

According to him, seamless connectivity is equally critical but extended flight times due to airspace constraints have significantly increased misconnection risk.

"Proactive connection management — before disruption, not after — must remain a priority for all of us by identifying risks before they materialise and going the extra mile for the customers when they do," he said.

Aggarwal said that FY27 offers "structural tailwinds" with a fully retrofitted narrow-body fleet, accelerating wide-body upgrades, strengthened global partnerships and a sharpened commercial framework.

"The platform is stronger than at any point in recent years. FY27 is about conversion — converting product into yield, partnerships into share, data into decisions, and consistency into trust," he noted.

As its wide-body fleet increases, the airline would expand presence in existing markets such as Germany and Japan, as well as launch new international destinations from Delhi and Mumbai hubs over the next 12 months.

By the end of 2026, Aggarwal said 20 more wide-body aircraft will carry the new product - comprising five new B787-9s, two A350-1000s and more than a dozen retrofitted legacy Boeing 787s.

Also, the cooperation agreements with Singapore Airlines and Lufthansa Group would materially strengthen the airline's reach across Southeast Asia and continental Europe, covering scheduling, sales, distribution, and loyalty integration, Aggarwal said.

Another focus area would be network optimisation aimed at strengthening its hubs and enhancing seamless domestic-to-international and international-to-international connectivity.

As part of its commercial strategy for FY27, the airline would also focus on customer-centric and premiumisation-led growth.

Aggarwal also said that following the completion of the Air India Express network restructuring, the focus will be on optimal deployment of different fleet types and enhancing utilisation.

"With the induction of new aircraft, AIX will expand across markets in Asia and the Middle East, while building its domestic operations from hubs in Bengaluru, Delhi, and Navi Mumbai," Aggarwal, who is also the Chairman of Air India Express, said.

While mentioning that FY26 was arguably the most challenging operating year for Air India. The Chief Commercial Officer said airspace closures across Pakistan, Iran and Iraq, geopolitical volatility affecting demand patterns, and the tragic events surrounding AI171 created headwinds that few airlines face within a single financial year.

"And yet, we adapted. We protected our network, stabilised operations, and continued advancing our transformation agenda," he added.

On June 12, 2025, an Air India Boeing 787-8 aircraft enroute from Ahmedabad to London Gatwick crashed soon after take off, killing 260 people, including 241 people who were onboard.

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