"We signed an agreement two days ago whereby we will help each other for spare parts or inventories concerned and even offer our Airbus A320 for training of Kingfisher's pilots," G R Gopinath, managing director, Air Deccan said in Mumbai at the launch of ICICI Bank Air Deccan gold card, a loyalty card programme for their customers.
Both the airlines have common type of aircraft (Airbus A320s) and engines and this is for the first time that two private airlines have reached such an agreement, analysts said.
Air Deccan had gone to court against a pilot, who had completed A320 training, who later quit and joined Kingfisher Airlines.
Capt Gopinath said his airline would break even this fiscal. "Though the figure might be small, we shall break even this year on a turnover of $94 million."
On tapping the market, he said, "We have an equity base of Rs 225 crore (Rs 2.25 billion) and already raised Rs 200 crore (Rs 2 billion). We are talking to institutional investors on the initial public offering in the next 12-18 months."
"The issue size could be up to $400 million to finance the fleet plan of 30 A320s and 30 ATR-72s till 2010," he said.