Indian companies are increasingly finding themselves at the very top of global charts.
India’s Indigo has become the world’s most valuable airline company by market capitalization. As of 3 pm IST’s data shared by Companies by Market Cap, Indigo is now ahead of US’s Delta Airlines, which has been pushed to second spot. This is the first time an Indian airline has been the most valuable airline in the world.
Indigo’s move to the top of the world charts has been driven by a strong showing in its stock price. Indigo’s stock is up 12 percent this month, and has solidly outperformed the benchmark indices in India. In contrast, US aviation stocks have been struggling — Delta is down 28 percent this month, while United Airlines is down 27 percent after turmoil in the US stock markets following US tariffs.
This combination of factors has helped Indigo become the world’s most valuable airline. It is now followed by Delta Airlines, Ryanair, United Airlines and Air China. Southwest Airlines, IAG, Singapore Airlines, China Southern Airlines and Turkish Airlines make up the next five spots. There are 3 US airlines and 2 Chinese airlines in the top 10 — there’s only one Indian airline on the list, but it’s at the top spot.
It helps that Indigo has a 60 percent share in India’s rapidly-growing aviation market. Many of India’s airlines, such as Jet Airways, Air Deccan and Kingfisher have gone bust over the last few decades, which has meant that Indigo has lapped up their market share. Existing airlines like SpiceJet too are struggling, which has helped Indigo gain even more market share.
But this has been a pretty extraordinary journey for Indigo, which was founded in just 2006 by Rahul Bhatia and Rakesh Gangwal. It had looked to differentiate itself by being a low-cost carrier that focused on low fares, on-time performance and a hassle-free experience. By 2012, Indigo had become India’s largest airline by the number of passengers. It is now even more dominant, and alone accounts for over half of domestic flight traffic. Indigo now has over 316 aircraft, and serves more than 100 destinations, including 80+ domestic and 30+ international routes.
Indigo has now become the world’s most valuable airline. This is a tag that Indian companies could soon get used to — just last month, JSW month had become the world’s most valuable steel producer by market cap, and Indigo has now become the world’s most valuable airline. India’s massive 1.4 billion population means that its companies have a massive domestic market at the ready, and if they can keep executing well, and the Indian economy continues to fire, they might be soon many more world-beating Indian companies on Indian shores.