Air Sahara to be renamed as JetLite

New Delhi: After Jet agreeing to buy Air Sahara for Rs 1,450 crore last week, the airline will be renamed JetLite.

Naresh Goyal of Jet Airways said that the market share of the combined entity is seen at 33 per cent post the acquisition of Sahara.

Talking about the Air Sahara employee, Goyal said that no Air Sahara employee will lose job. All employees will either be employed by Jet Airways or Sahara Parivar.

Jet and Air Sahara's combined FY08 net revenues are seen at $2.5 billion.

He further adds that Jet Airways will raise $400 million to fund overseas expansion. Also, Jet and Air Sahara will operate as independent companies.

In another development Jet Airways on Monday said that it would refurbish its existing domestic Boeing 737 fleet to provide more comfort.

"The existing fleet for domestic operations will be configured with new seats in the premiere and economy cabins and will offer more space and enhanced features," PTI quoted Naresh Goyal as saying.

Jet has a fleet of 49 classic and next generation Boeing 737 aircraft. That apart, it has eight modern ATR 72-500 turboprop aircraft operating in the domestic services. It has an average fleet age of 5.3 years.

“The Boeing 737 aircraft will be fitted with the state-of -the-art advanced in-flight entertainment system from Panasonic,” Goyal added.

Jet Airways is the first Boeing 737 customer to have installed an audio-video on-demand in-flight entertainment in a narrow body aircraft.