As part of its efforts to restore Jet Airways, the Kalrock Jalan group is assembling a senior management team. On Friday, the consortium announced the selection of Sanjiv Kapoor, a veteran of the aviation industry, as its CEO. On April 4, Kapoor will assume command.
Kapoor is the president of Oberoi Hotels and Resorts at the moment. He was the chief strategy and commercial officer at Vistara before joining the Oberoi group, where he supervised strategy, marketing, network planning, and other responsibilities.
In 2014-15, he served as SpiceJet’s COO, developing innovative pricing and marketing methods. The airline also had a liquidity problem around this time due to rising oil fares, which resulted in a change of ownership. In 2016, Kapoor quit SpiceJet.
During the time when Vistara evolved from 9 to 45 aircraft, Kapoor was in charge of strategy, network, marketing, product development, and all other commercial responsibilities, as well as major operating divisions like cabin services, ground services, and the operational control centre.
Kapoor is Jet Airways’ second top-level hire, following the appointment of P P Singh as the airline’s accountable manager. Singh previously worked for Jet Airways and headed JetLite, a Jet Airways subsidiary.
Jet Airways, which is currently owned by the Jalan Kalrock consortium, had planned to reopen in the first quarter of 2022, but that appears improbable, and the airline could reopen in the summer months.
Jet currently employs roughly 150 people, and the airline is in talks with vendors, including lessors, about the restart. Jet ceased operations in April 2019, owing to mounting losses, debts, and dues. The National Company Law Tribunal accepted it for insolvency proceedings in June 2019. In June of this year, the bankruptcy court accepted JKC’s resolution plan after a two-year insolvency procedure.
