Airline a difficult venture in Bangladesh

Bangladesh has an ill-defined policy regime, infrastructure limitations, high cost of business and sky-high fuel cost which makes it difficult to sustain airline ventures here, said Novoair Managing Director Mofizur Rahman.

"On top of that if you have a very uneven field for competition with a state-owned airline which survives with an unfathomable state subsidy, their premature airline mortality is bound to happen," he said while talking to The Daily Star.

The Novoair managing director said this on the occasion of the airline's 10th anniversary today.

Novoair was established in 2007 with a vision of "Excellence in Aviation'' and the motto "ART of Aviation'', which emanates from the conviction that Novoair's endeavours would be on providing the best of service to its clients.

The private airlines launched commercial operations on January 9, 2013, with three 89-seat Embraer 145 jet aircraft.

From 2016 to 2019, seven 72-seat ATR 72-500 turboprop aircraft replaced the Embraer 145 aircraft in phases. Currently, Novoair owns all of them.

The airline currently operates on all domestic destinations in the country alongside a lone international destination to Kolkata.

In 10 years, more than 1 lakh flights have been operated and the airlines served more than 5.5 million passengers.

Novoair was named "Best Domestic Airline" in 2014 and 2019 and "Best On time Performance Airline" in 2021 by Bangladesh Monitor, a fortnightly journal on aviation and tourism.

"Our mission is to provide safe, reliable and friendly air services in partnership with our customers, suppliers and the communities we serve. One of our goals is to set ourselves the pinnacle of standards and we deliver on our promises," said Rahman.

"Thrilling" is the one word he used to describe the airline's journey so far.

"While there was many an occasion to rejoice our achievements, on the other hand, there were frustrating roadblocks on the way and we had to navigate forward removing those roadblocks one by one and reach our destination," he said.

"We had a stated objective of setting up an airline for people where they will find world-class service coupled with safety," he added.

"I believe we have been able to live up to our promise and we are relentlessly trying to reach a higher ceiling," said Rahman.

"Airline by default is a challenging venture and that is truer for our country. We continue to face challenges but we are in a relentless stride to overcome those," he said.

About the prospect of the country's aviation industry, he said, "Undoubtedly we have the prospect to be an aviation hub in regional perspective with a 170 million plus population."

"A sustained GDP growth and a big diaspora living around the world is certainly a big strength for our aviation to grow."

On the government's ongoing development works in different airports, he said such work, including the construction of a third terminal at the Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport, were very essential components of the overall aviation ecosystem.

"This will be only meaningful if we have a robust aviation industry to complement that. We need to ensure the sustainability of the aviation industry, the airline sector to be very specific."

About Novoair's future plan, he said, "We have a stated objective of being a successful boutique airline to be reckoned in a sub-regional and regional perspective."

"As a part of that aspiration, we are on a relentless stride to fulfil our regional aspirations. Soon we intend to induct narrow-body aircraft to connect the promising dots around us."