AVGEEK
Connecting airlines with the wider travel business
Skift’s Rafat Ali examines India’s travel market and the idea of a connected trip, including closer airline–hotel relationships and the potential role of AI.
The conversation
I caught up with Rafat just a few days after the conclusion of a very successful Skift India Forum 2025. We engaged in a comprehensive conversation about the power of travel, the intricate relationship with aviation, the Indian market, and the potential benefits of a "connected trip." We also discussed in detail his thoughts on Air India and IndiGo, the potential of artificial intelligence in travel, and how airlines can work more closely with other players in the sector, including hotels, to up their game!
Rafat Ali - @rafat Vishal Mehra - @vishal1mehra
Key Takeaways
- Ali argues that airlines, hotels and booking platforms see different parts of one traveller's journey; a connected-trip proposition depends on integrating these fragmented experiences.
- He contrasts India's growing domestic and outbound travel appetite with weaker inbound-tourism performance, attributing the gap partly to destination marketing and visitor-experience barriers.
- His proposed response includes more durable public-private tourism promotion, better visa interfaces and serious attention to safety, infrastructure and pollution.
- Ali regards Air India's nonstop network and the appeal of Indian hospitality as assets, but says an inconsistent hard product and execution still weaken the international customer proposition.
- He sees IndiGo's scale and low-fare efficiency as powerful while distinguishing airline growth from strong emotional customer loyalty.
- Ali expects AI agents to change travel discovery and booking, but does not claim they can automatically resolve regulatory or destination-quality problems.
- He identifies concerts, sports and other live events as potential drivers of travel demand beyond traditional destination marketing.
Editorial analysis
Who really owns the connected trip?
Rafat Ali thinks travel remains a fragmented industry despite selling one continuous customer journey. An airline typically loses sight of a traveller at arrival; a hotel sees only the stay; payment and booking intermediaries observe another piece. An online travel agency with the right permissions and integrations can plausibly link the components into a “connected trip,” making the competition about distribution, customer knowledge and retention rather than a single air ticket. This also explains Skift’s editorial business: Ali built the publication around the information gap between aviation, accommodation, tourism boards and technology.
India’s inbound tourism problem
The India debate has a critical asymmetry. Domestic travel demand and outbound aspiration have strengthened, but Ali argues that inbound tourism promotion, visitor experience and destination readiness have lagged. He identifies visa usability, personal safety, pollution, infrastructure outside major centres and the fragmented responsibility of government and private stakeholders. His suggestion is an enduring public-private destination-marketing organisation, using Puerto Rico as a comparative example. His figure for a historic Incredible India budget reduction is discussed orally and cannot be republished as a verified percentage without the underlying budget documents.
Airline strategy and the limits of AI
The airline section is less triumphalist than the orderbook headlines. Ali regards Air India’s home-market nonstops and Indian hospitality strengths as a competitive opportunity, while highlighting hard-product inconsistency, airport lounges, customer service and international one-stop competition. He sees the scale of IndiGo’s domestic operation but worries about equating growth with love for the product. The closing discussion shifts to AI agents, sports and live events, and the possibility that an outsider rather than an incumbent OTA will redesign travel booking. These remain views and forecasts, not a documented market outcome.
Questions & answers
Why did Ali establish Skift?
Travel research and news lagged other digital industries, creating an opportunity for a connected B2B publication and events business.
Why combine aviation and other travel sectors?
A single consumer’s journey cuts across airlines, hotels and digital intermediaries that rarely share a full view.
What emerged from the Skift India Forum?
India has strong internal demand but faces a persistent inbound-tourism, promotion and infrastructure challenge.
How would inbound tourism improve?
A sustainable public-private promotion model plus easier visas, stronger safety and destination quality.
What is AI likely to change?
Personalised discovery and agentic booking, but not public policy or physical destination issues.
Sources & attribution
Original conversation: The Indian AvGeek — Episode 33. Originally published 30 March 2025.
Historical context: This analysis reflects statements and assessments made during the original 2025 conversation. Strategies, forecasts, regulations, commercial claims and figures should be read in that period rather than as an independently verified account of October 2026.
Editorial Q&A: These are sourced explanatory paraphrases, not verbatim quotations from the guest.
Interpretation note: Forward-looking statements and market comparisons are attributed to the speakers’ contemporary arguments rather than asserted as established outcomes.