Jet Airways plans IPO

New Delhi: Jet Airways is planning to go public with an initial public offering (IPO). The finer details of the IPO are expected to be finalised in the next two or three weeks, the airline''s chairman, Naresh Goyal, told reporters in New Delhi, yesterday.

"We should hopefully come out with an IPO in this fiscal itself. We have a consortium of banks examining various issues such as how much should be diluted or divested. All this should be decided in the next couple of weeks. In fact, who is to be the lead banker has also not yet been decided," Goyal said.

Goyal, however, noted that it would be wrong to say that Jet''s decision to go in for an IPO was based on the recent government decision to hike the foreign direct investment limit in the aviation sector to 49 per cent from 40 per cent earlier.

"We have been studying the IPO market for many years. It''s not a sudden decision. We have been looking at it for a long time," he said.

The proceeds from the IPO will be used to further improve the airline''s balance sheet, the debt- equity ratio, and fund the future plans, Goyal said. When asked whether the airline was in the black, Goyal said that Jet was making money, both in terms of net and operating profits.