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A biennial event, Bahrain International Airshow is organised by the Ministry of Transport, Bahrain Civil Aviation Affairs (BCAA) in association with Farnborough International. The third edition of the airshow was bigger and better this time with more than a hundred participating companies, including several new ones. The airshow attracted delegations from 32 countries including the US, UAE, India, China, Germany, France, the Russian Federation, Egypt and Turkey. In fact, the event witnessed for the first time participation from India, namely the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).
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Kamal Bin Ahmed Mohamed
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The airshow also saw a record number of deals signed this year – almost US$ three billion, tripling the total from 2012. Conceding that Bahrain International Airshow is a new airshow on the tourism calendar, Kamal Bin Ahmed Mohamed, minister of transportation and acting chief executive, Bahrain Economic Development Board, said, “The number of companies have doubled this year. It is not just names like Airbus and Boeing but many companies participating for the first time, like that from India. DRDO participated for the first time in the airshow to promote its products in this part of the world. There are eight companies from Turkey, Lufthansa Technik from Germany participating for the first time, two biggest companies from France that is Safran and Thales.” He pointed out that because of the large number of companies participating this year, apart from the chalets which were always there, a hall was constructed to accommodate companies to showcase their products. “We hope that by bringing the customers – that is all Gulf countries and other Arab countries and all the international companies they will have an environment to crack deals. Only in Bahrain the chalets are not built by the companies, they are read-built with furniture and catering. It is a turnkey package. You do not see this in any other airshow in the world. Companies come with their bags and start their meetings. There are VVIP chalets. We make it very easy for companies to come and do their business, which is the unique proposition for Bahrain,” mentioned the minister.
Bahrain International Airshow had a mix of civil aviation and military – approximately in the ratio of 60:40. The Farnborough International Airshow in UK is an important event and BCAA organised the Bahrain airshow with Farnborough to ensure quality, and do it right. “The region also has Dubai airshow, but we are offering something different. All the companies you see there you will see here. The airshow enables us to bring companies and visitors here to showcase Bahrain. We have the infrastructure available in Bahrain, to set up business here. Following the airshow is the Spring of Culture which is a musical show, then the Formula 1 in April. MICE industry is important for us and having these events achieves the critical target for Bahrain. We have a busy calender throughout the year. There is a convention centre in Manama with plans for a new, bigger one in the pipeline,” he stated. Aerobatic flying displays was in fact one of the highlights of the airshow and enthralled the thousands of visitors attending the airshow and the public who had thronged nearby. Aircraft on display included the Breitling Wingwalkers, The Twisters, The Russian Knights, UAE Al Fursan and the Saudi Hawks.
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Showcasing Indian technology
DRDO had displayed the models of Light Combat Aircraft – Trainer Model, Fighter Model and Naval version at the airshow. “Apart from this as technology we have displayed the OBOGS (On Board Oxygen Generation System) for LCA. Only few countries in the world have been able to develop this technology. We want to show the world that we have developed advanced systems for aircraft,” said P Ramachandra, joint director (Planning), Aeronautical Development Agency.
| India connect |
| Currently around 300,000 Indians live in the Kingdom of Bahrain, and are the biggest expat community. Bahrain as a destination has been promoted as a business destination, being a hub between the west and the east. It is an attractive destination for multinational companies who make the country a base to serve the GCC market. “Nobody can ignore the growth happening here, or India or Far East China. Companies from different parts of the world flock to the Gulf markets as they have a high GDP per capita growth, a young population, and they are still spending in developing their countries, whether in terms of infrastructure or entertainment. I cannot say we have done enough to attract tourists from outside the region, we already have five million tourists from Saudi Arabia. We are now concentrating on bringing tourists from other markets. When it comes to attractions here, we have real things to show the visitors with our thousands of years of culture. There is nothing artificial,” said Kamal Bin Ahmed Mohamed, minister of transportation and acting chief executive, Bahrain Economic Development Board. He informed that in February 2014 a large delegation will be coming to India with the King of Bahrain, Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa. This high profile delegation will be visiting Mumbai and Delhi. |
Also on display was the airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) system. Models of Nishant and Lakshya were also showcased. Nishant is a UAV that is used for requisition and surveillance, Lakshya is a PTA, it is a pilotless target aircraft. “Already the production has started, we recently got the initial operational clearance and this year it will be inducted into the Indian Airforce. The response is very good and people showed a lot of interest in the products,” stated Ramachandra. An aircraft from India took part in the flying display.
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Focus on Gulf Air
Almost 15 years back, for most people in India, Gulf Air was the first airline that came to mind when thinking of flying to the Middle East region. The airline was owned by four countries in the region till 2008, it was the only airline in the region owned by Qatar, Bahrain, Oman and the Emirates. By 2008, all these countries developed their own airlines, following which only Bahrain owns Gulf Air. “This led to the change in the size of the market. We cannot to have a big airline like the other neighbouring countries, as we do not have the amount of gas and oil that they have, and we cannot afford to make mistakes. We have to use our resources effectively. For us Gulf Air is very important for connectivity to Bahrain. We want connectivity to the GCC market, India and Asia. When it comes to this market, we have a largest concentration of flights within the region. We have daily flights to Mumbai, Delhi, Trivandrum, Chennai and other destinations. In the past one only saw Gulf Air because there was only Gulf Air, the numbers have not changed, but others have introduced their flights and because of the size of their fleet you see them more. We are not planning to compete with their numbers, we are going to concentrate on quality and specific markets that we think are critical for Bahrain,” stated the minister.
He acknowledged that Gulf Air has gone through tough times financially and restructuring process has been started. “We are now doing much better, we have cut the losses by almost 56 per cent, so we are on the right track. This we achieved through changes in fleet, network, number of employees. We had to close some destinations that were losing money like Kuala Lumpur. We are now adding new destinations, for instance we just added Trivandrum as a new destination in India,” he informed.
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Gulf Air has not exhausted its bi-laterals in India. “The India market is very important but the competition is huge. The current network is a good network, we are fine-tuning it. We however do not want to be a transfer hub, as that is what we used to do earlier and loose a lot of money. The strategy is point to point destination. The airport is also being refurbished and expanded. We have the youngest fleet in the region, for wide bodied aircraft we have placed orders for Dreamliners which we will get by 2018,” said the minister.
