Paramount in talks with Airbus, Boeing for international foray: Report

New Delhi: With the domestic airline industry currently in the throes of a crisis that is testing the survival skills of a number of players, Chennai-based Paramount Airways is reportedly planning to make an international foray by 2011.

According to a report in a national daily, Paramount Airways managing director M Thiagarajan has said his airline is currently chalking out its international strategy, which will involve the use of a long-range version of an Embraer aircraft that Paramount currently uses for its short haul flights.

Thiagarajan also told the paper his airline is ''weighing the option of the Dreamliner and the A350 for all other international routes.''

The report suggests that Paramount Airways is in talks with both civil aircraft manufacturers, Airbus and Boeing, for their most advanced upcoming aircraft the Airbus A350 and Boeing's 787 Dreamliner.

The report also says that Paramount, which has a fleet of five Embraer aircraft, will add another four to its fleet this year, with another 30 planes joining the fleet over the coming three year period.

The report quoted Paramount's managing director as saying that divesting from the airline is not planned, and that funding for the aircraft acquisition program will be met by ''internal accruals and innovative funding options available to us like financial leases and the Exim Bank.''

Paramount is also said to be launching its first maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) facility for Embraer aircraft in India by the year of the end, at an outlay of almost $35-40 million.