Air India’s enhances codeshare with Lufthansa Group

Air India has entered into a new codeshare agreement with Austrian Airlines and expanded existing agreements between Air India, Lufthansa, and SWISS. Air India and the Lufthansa Group will codeshare on ~100 routes across the Indian subcontinent, Europe, Australia, and the Americas, the airline said. Incidentally, the current Air India has an equity partnership with Singapore Airlines, which has about a 25 percent stake in the Indian carrier. SIA pumped in an additional Rs 319 billion in November 2024 for the stake ( SIA and Lufthansa are founding partners of the global airline alliance Star Alliance, which was established in 1997. Air India joined the alliance in 2014. The expanded partnership between Air India and the Lufthansa Group will significantly boost flight options and connectivity for travelers between India and Europe. The addition of close to 60 codeshare routes operated by the four airlines—SWISS, Lufthansa, Austrian, and Air India—will span 12 Indian and 26 European cities. The expanded agreements will increase the codeshare routes between Air India, Lufthansa, and SWISS from 55 to nearly 100. The new agreement between Air India and Austrian Airlines will add another 26 codeshare routes. Air India will now offer its passengers 26 destinations across Europe and three destinations in the Americas beyond Frankfurt, Vienna, and Zurich, which are the gateways of the European airlines. The agreement will see the AI designator code being placed on some flights of Austrian for the first time, including those to Amsterdam, Barcelona, Berlin, Bremen, Brussels, Copenhagen, Dresden, Düsseldorf, Dublin, Geneva, Hamburg, Hannover, Luxembourg, Manchester, Marseille, Munich, Nice, Oslo, Prague, Stockholm, Stuttgart, Valencia from Zurich.. Win-Win for international and Indian travelers The Lufthansa Group's benefit is that it will now be able to connect to Air India’s domestic services to or from 15 cities within the country, including Ahmedabad, Amritsar, Bengaluru, Bhubaneswar, Chennai, Delhi, Goa Mopa, Goa Dabolim, Hyderabad, Indore, Kochi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Pune, and Thiruvananthapuram. Passengers on SWISS Air will be able to connect over Zurich to Amsterdam, Barcelona, Berlin, Bremen, Brussels, Copenhagen, Dresden, Düsseldorf, Dublin, Geneva, Hamburg, Hannover, Luxembourg, Manchester, Marseille, Munich, Nice, Oslo, Prague, Stockholm, Stuttgart, Valencia. Flights currently operated by Air India and the Lufthansa Group’s airlines between India and Germany or Switzerland will be covered under the expanded codeshare partnership. This means a passenger flying from Delhi will now have three daily flight options, each with ‘LH’ flight numbers, including two flights operated by Air India and one by Lufthansa. Air India and the three Lufthansa Group airlines are members of Star Alliance. Frequent flyers will continue to earn and redeem points/miles on all four airlines. At the same time, elite status holders of Air India’s Maharaja Club and Lufthansa Group’s Miles & More programs will benefit from Star Alliance Gold benefits, which include priority services, extra baggage allowance, and airport lounge access worldwide. Commenting on the agreement, Lufthansa Group Chief Commercial Officer Dieter Vranckx said that “further enhancing our cooperation, we will increase the travel options between Europe and India and offer our passengers improved access to additional destinations. Lufthansa Group remains committed to India, and we are excited about the possibilities and potential the country and Air India as a partner have to offer.” Nipun Aggarwal, Air India's Chief Commercial Officer, added that Air India’s flyers will access more destinations and greater flexibility to travel across Europe on the Lufthansa Group carriers.

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