Today, we’re calling an audible. Rather than humble brag about our own work, I’m going to shamelessly brag about someone else’s.

Specifically, we’re showcasing an analysis completed by Ro Lakkamraju, a Junior at Southern Methodist University majoring in Applied Science, Economics, and Finance.

Ro reached out a few months ago looking to learn more about the industry. I naturally did what any lazy mentor would do - I asked him to teach me something new.

So he did.

Ro put together a fascinating analysis on the dynamics of the Indian travel market. He combined his experience with macroeconomics in India together with an interest in how IndiGo was serving the market. After several trips to our office in McKinney Texas, Ro had pulled the data, built the charts, and crafted the story.

How successful was he? We don’t put our logo on just anything.

India remains one of the most fascinating markets. While the mature economies complain of the coalescing “K” shape to the economy and China faces steep population decline, India continues to ascend. In a way, the traditional story of the BRIC nations is now one almost solely of the I. Brazil has taken a breather to deal with inflation and to reassess its reliance on commodities. Russia is, well Russia. China is dealing with the shrinking population and loss of the labor cost advantage of the past generations. India, on the other hand, is now the most populous country in the world - a metric worthy of its own celebration - and it remains the last bastion of both growth and an emerging middle class.

It is this emergence of disposable income that generates the greatest idea mankind has had for which to dispose of that income - air travel. And yet, as large a market as India is, it’s really a group of connected regions. Because, of course it is. Yet, we tend to think of India as one market, rather than the collection of regions that total four times the population of North America.

The tech boom is hitting India in different ways. Hyderabad, Chennai, and Bangalore saw per capital income double over the past 13 years. And yet, it wasn’t the nominal growth rates, but those adjusted for U.S. dollar exchange rates and inflation. A per capita constant U.S. dollar increase of over 50% in just over a decade is impressive. In fact, of the large markets, only Kolkata lagged the U.S. average.

And as the economy has emerged, so have the travelers. Even as airlines like IndiGo built success on the domestic Indian market, it is the emergence of the international Indian traveler that has prompted international growth from the region. The country issued a record 15 million passports in 2024, up from a then-record 14 million in 2023. At the same time, the number of countries accessible to Indian travelers without a visa continues to grow.

This is not to say India doesn’t have it’s challenges. The country is also dealing with inflation and a reliance on imports (see: Strait of Hormuz). But, the growth rate has been powerful enough to propel the economy in the right direction at a rate the remaining BRCs have not been able to match.

India is the lone bastion of the large growth and rapidly emerging middle class story, but that’s not to suggest things are bad elsewhere. It’s just that, in a post-COVID world, India’s growth is coalescing in a way that feels so… traditional.

These are only a handful of the charts and analyses Ro put together. Later, we’ll take a look at IndiGo’s approach to serving this unique market from a schedule perspective.

Until then, I’ll share with you a little bit of Ro’s secret sauce. Yes, he has the analytical, economic, and technical chops, not to mention what I could only refer to as the professional poise of a person three times his age (he even presented his initiative to empower visually-impaired students to the United Nations). But it’s Ro’s combination of curiosity and raw gumption that makes it all work.

But before you rush to recruit Ro for that prestigious summer internship, that privilege has already been taken by Sarasota Bradenton International Airport where he is working with the Air Service Development team.

Ro will graduate SMU in May, 2028.

For the first time in the history of Aviation’s Week in Charts, all major aviation companies are up over the past week. Don’t blink, or you’ll miss it!

We like to create valuable charts. But it’s not easy to come up with new ideas amid the endless hours spent delivering data-driven edge to our customers. In our quest to provide a valuable weekly newsletter, we can keep guessing what you find most valuable, or you could just tell us.

If you have an idea for data visualization, reply to this email and let us know what analysis you’d find most valuable. We’d love to hear from you and will happily name-drop.

As valuable as it is, don't worry; it's entirely free. If you would like to receive analyses like this regularly, subscribe below.

Then...

You can pay it forward by sending it to your colleagues. They gain valuable insights, and you get credit for finding new ideas!

Win-win!

Subscribe here