A Journey from Turboprops to Turbofans !
Hyderabad based Trujet was running as a regular regional carrier by Promoter KV Pradeep from year 2015 , untill suddenly the company showed some aggresive expansion plans !
Deviating from a Turboprop fleet (ATR-72 aircrafts) to TurboFans needed some boost and the Booster was none other than US-based investor Interups.
Who is behaind this Agressive expansion plans ?
Led by Chairman Laxmi Prasad, US based Interups is not a new player, it had earlier shown interest in bidding process of Indian Flag bearer Air india in December .
So, the company has definite interests in aviation and belief in South asia's aviation growth story.
The Investment in TruJet .
After closure of defunct Jet airways bidding , Interups developed an interest to pump funds in a regional carrier , and after negotiations, agreed to buy a 49% stake inTruJet.
TruJet’s new 49% stakeholder Interups has huge plans for the Hyderabad-based regional carrier. Interups has allocated $1.89bn towards growing the airlines, which it plans to invest over three years.
Trujet promoter KV Pradeep, also group director Megha Engineering and Infrastructures Limited says,
"The funds raised through 49per cent FDI in the company, will be utilized to expand its operations pan India and explore the newer opportunities in the civil aviation sector. We will finalise the exact final amount at a later stage," said ,
As of now, TruJet flies to 21 airports in india with seven ATR 72 aircrafts, routes mostly includes tier-2 cities under indian government's UDAN-RCS program .
The Brazilian and European Combo !
Trujet is in talks with European Airbus for A220 and Bazilian Embraer for E190-E2 aircrafts , of which it wants to see 54 of each aircraft types in the fleet.
Interups' Laxmi Prasad is quite optimistic as he says,
“Airbus and Embraer have already identified some aircraft. And with the addition of these, it will take us to 21 almost immediately…Embraer will supply three aircraft every two months. The arrangement with Airbus will see one aircraft coming in every 1.5 months, or a maximum of nine planes a year. So, it may take about six years for the Airbus order to be delivered, lower for Embraer.”
Current TruJet Fleet
Current Trujet Fleet Consists of two ATR 72-600 and five ATR 72-212A Turboprop aircrafts.
Registrations are : VT-TMC , VT-TMT, VT-TMN, VT-TMM, VT-TMP, VT-TMK , VT-TMU.
