Emirates SkyCargo Keeps the World Connected with Over 10,000 Flights in 3 Months

Between April and June 2020, Emirates SkyCargo has facilitated the movement of essential commodities and other supplies for individual consumers and businesses across the world by operating more than 10,000 cargo flights to destinations across six continents. The flights were a mix of scheduled, ad-hoc and charter operations.

Nabil Sultan, Emirates Divisional Senior Vice President, Cargo said: “As a customer focused organisation, Emirates SkyCargo has innovatively adapted our cargo operations and offerings over the last few months in line with rapidly evolving market demand. In keeping with our core value as a global facilitator of trade and economies, we have re-grown our network to over 100 destinations with robust flight frequencies to key production and consumer markets. We continue to be able to offer our customers an unmatched reach and connectivity for their valuable cargo and our flight milestones are a validation of our customers’ trust in our service.”

During the months of May and June, Emirates SkyCargo operated on an average more than 3,800 flights per month, with the aircraft travelling to over 100 destinations and covering approximately 37 million kilometres, which is the equivalent distance of roughly 50 trips to the moon and back.

Starting from just over 35 destinations at the end of March 2020, Emirates SkyCargo has expanded its network to over 100 scheduled cargo destinations across the world for the month of July 2020. From transporting urgently needed medical supplies and food to materials required for manufacturing and other industries from origin to destination, Emirates SkyCargo is helping reconnect cities to international trade lanes as manufacturing and other economic activities recommence.

Blue Dart Ranked Amongst the ‘Top 50 of India’s Best Companies to Work For – 2020’

Blue Dart, India’s leading logistics services provider, as part of Deutsche Post DHL Group (DPDHL), has been ranked amongst the Top 50 of India’s Best Companies to Work For – 2020 by the Great Place to Work® (GPTW) Institute and The Economic Times. In addition, Blue Dart has been awarded with the elite ‘Laureate Medal’ for being in the top 100 best organizations to have been featured in ‘India’s Best Companies to Work For’ list for 10 years. 

Commenting on being ranked amongst India’s Best Companies to Work For – 2020, Balfour Manuel, Managing Director, Blue Dart Express Limited said, “We are extremely honoured that Blue Dart has been recognised amongst the Top 50 of India’s Best Companies to Work For – 2020. We are even happier that our company has received the elite ‘Laureate Medal’ for featuring in the Top 100 Organizations recognised by Great Place to Work® for 10 years in a row. Blue Dart has always been an organisation that prioritizes its people. Our Blue Darters, the heart of our business, are the ones who make us market leaders with strong brand equity and market leadership. It is with their consistent prowess that we can call ourselves a Provider of Choice and an Investment of Choice to our customers. It is what makes us ensure that we remain an Employer of Choice for them. Through our ‘People First Philosophy’, we continue to invest in our people and create an enabling environment for their all-round development, which in turn drives and exceeds our customer and stakeholder expectations at all times. I am humbled to be part of this team.”

Rajendra Ghag, CHRO, Blue Dart Express Limited added, “We understand that the foundation of our business are our Blue Darters. ‘Highly engaged Blue Darters encourage Happy Customers’; this has been our motto from the very beginning. At Blue Dart, we understand that a good foundation for an organisation stems from strong brand values. We therefore instil, in our teams, our four values of Passion, Can Do, Right First Time and As One. We ensure our teams are taken care of through various HR initiatives, a few of which include, the Death Benevolent Fund (DBF) which aims to help resolve the financial crisis of the family rising due to the death of a team member as well as Upstairs, a program that aims to help children of team members by offering a scholarship program that provides them with Rs.1,00,000 per year along with a mentor.”

Since its inception in 1983, Blue Dart has been an organisation with a great workplace culture and strong talent retention. Most of the senior management team consists of home grown talent who have risen through the ranks. The organisation encourages growth and provides ample opportunity to skilled individuals ensuring they have a multitude of day one Blue Darters, including the current Managing Director, Balfour Manuel.

Recognized for their Best Practices such as the ‘Blue Way’ delivery program, an innovative initiative that allows every Blue Darter to participate in last mile delivery to ensure customer delight, Blue Dart paves the way as an organization that will always keep its people first and ensures dignity of labour. The Blue Way program sees the Senior Management Team, including the Managing Director, part-take in the delivery process. Blue Dart is South Asia’s undisputed express logistics leader that drives a culture of innovation, agility, excellence with a high focus on customer centricity.

Every year the Great Place to Work® study, which assesses the experience of over 12 million employees in more than 10,000 organisations across industries, recognises ‘India’s Best Companies to Work For’ based on their employee survey and people practices assessment. Bifurcating this further, Great Place to Work® (GPTW) Institute further recognizes 100 Best Organisations with an employee strength of over 500 which represent over 21 industry sectors.

GPTW primarily uses 3 dimensions to evaluate and identify the best cultures:

The first dimension measures the quality of employee experience through their globally validated survey instrument known as Trust IndexTM. The survey helps in seeking anonymous feedback from employees.

The second dimension is called the Culture AuditTM, a proprietary tool of the Institute that evaluates the people practices of an organisation, covering the entire employee life-cycle.

The third dimension is called Great Place To Work FOR ALLTM and ensures that everyone irrespective of their job role, tenure, age or gender at the Best Workplaces is having a consistently positive experience.

Emirates SkyCargo to Transport Upto 17 Tonnes More Cargo on Select Boeing 777-300ER Aircraft

Emirates has introduced additional cargo capacity by using Boeing 777-300ER aircraft with seats removed from the Economy Class cabin. The measure has been introduced in response to the strong air cargo market demand for the rapid, reliable and efficient transportation of essential commodities such as Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), pharmaceuticals, medical equipment, food, machinery and other supplies around the world.

Watch a video of how Emirates Engineering modified the aircraft here.

Emirates SkyCargo will be operating 10 Boeing 777-300ER aircraft with Economy Class seats removed allowing for up to 17 tonnes or 132 cubic metres of additional cargo capacity per flight on top of the 40-50 tonne cargo capacity in the belly hold of the widebody passenger aircraft. The modified Boeing 777-300ER aircraft are being deployed on routes to key production and consumer markets where Emirates SkyCargo sees maximum demand for movement of urgently required goods.

Nabil Sultan, Emirates Divisional Senior Vice President, Cargo said: “Since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, Emirates SkyCargo has taken very seriously its responsibility of connecting people and businesses across the world with the commodities that they urgently require. To this end, we have been working flat out, first to re-connect a global network of more than 85 destinations and then to introduce capacity options that fit what our customers demand from us including passenger aircraft flying only with belly hold cargo and loading cargo in the overhead bins and on passenger seats. Now, with the Emirates Boeing 777-300ER aircraft with modified Economy Class cabins, we will be able to transport even more cargo per flight, allowing for more cargo to reach their destination faster and for more efficient cargo operations.”

The modification of the Economy Class cabins of the 10 Emirates Boeing 777-300ER is being executed at the state of the art Emirates Engineering facilities in Dubai with each aircraft requiring close to 640 man-hours of work for the modification. Engineers remove 305 Economy Seats from one aircraft, fixing safety equipment and implementing regular load bearing tests during the process. Seven aircraft have already been modified by the Emirates Engineering team, with three more aircraft due to be ready by mid-July 2020.

Ahmed Safa, Divisional Senior Vice President Emirates Engineering said: “Converting our passenger aircraft to these mini freighters is certainly a sign of the times. Our teams have shown resilience, an innovative spirit, and adapted quickly to the needs of the changing business environment. We have risen to the twin challenges of new procedures and safety protocols within set timelines, and we are extremely proud of what we have achieved.”

By the end of the project, the Emirates Engineering team would have removed 3,050 seats, which will be safely and hygienically stored away till the time the aircraft are required for passenger services. The seats will be fitted back into the aircraft and tested for passenger safety and comfort.

With its focus on safety of operations, Emirates SkyCargo has implemented strict rules on the type of cargo that can be loaded inside the modified Economy Class cabins. Some of the cargo commodities that can be loaded include general cargo such as PPE and garments, pharmaceuticals that can be maintained within a temperature range of 15 and 25 degrees Celsius and perishables such as cut flowers, and select dry and non-smelling fruits and vegetables. Cargo loaded in the passenger cabins would need to be packaged inside a suitable external container such as a plastic or cardboard box in accordance with the latest regulations outlined by IATA.

Emirates SkyCargo is the freight division of Emirates. The air cargo carrier operates a combination of scheduled and chartered flights to more than 85 global destinations every week. During the Covid-19 pandemic, Emirates SkyCargo has been acting as a global conveyor belt connecting markets across the world to supplies of essential commodities including PPE, pharmaceuticals, food and other perishables, e-commerce goods as well as machinery and other equipment.

Emirates Engineering ensures that Emirates’ wide-body fleet of more than 260 aircraft are maintained in peak condition. The team is conducting regular parking checks on the grounded aircraft and scheduled A-checks, C-checks and operational maintenance on the flying fleet serving a mix of cargo and an increasing number of passenger destinations.

Air fares in India fall in time for New Year

Air fares have finally begun their descent to more reasonable levels this holiday season. On Saturday, Vijay Mallya-owned Kingfisher and low cost carriers — IndiGo and SpiceJet — decided to follow Jet and Air India in cutting fuel surcharge for domestic flights.

While full service carriers have dropped surcharge by Rs 400, LCCs — that had not raised them in last two rounds of jet fuel price hikes — have also reduced by Rs 200 to Rs 300. Now all Indian carriers, whether full service or low cost, have uniform fuel surcharge: Rs 1,950 for short flights and Rs 2,700 for those over one hour flying time.

LCCs like IndiGo and SpiceJet and AI (domestic) don't charge the congestion fee of Rs 150 that Jet and Kingfisher do. In fact, with the difference in fuel surcharge gone, LCCs would be under pressure to cut basic fares. They are looking at re-introducing attractive advance booking fares to stimulate demand. At present, full service carriers' fares are about 20% higher than LCCs and the latter want this gap to be 25-30% to be significantly cheaper.

The airlines' worst fears are coming true as the combined impact of economic glut and terror alerts has cast its shadow on passenger numbers in the ongoing peak travel season. The number of fliers is going to further drop from January to March (traditionally the leanest travel season). "We have to stimulate demand by attractive fares," said SpiceJet director Ajay Singh.