Mr. Ajay Singh is a first generation entrepreneur and is often regarded as the face of Indian aviation industry. Under his wing, SpiceJet is regarded as one of the most remarkable turnaround stories of recent times in Asia. SpiceJet was staring at an imminent shut down in December 2014, having cancelled hundreds of flights and owed substantial amounts of money to its business partners, when he came on-board.
In early 2017, SpiceJet placed an order for up to 205 narrow and wide bodied Boeing aircraft – the biggest order placed by any Indian airline with Boeing in its history, a fact highlighted by President Trump while hosting Prime Minister Modi in June 2017.
The order worth $22 billion would enable creation of 132,000 high-skilled, high-paid American jobs within the US.
He is aligned to the nationalistic vision of Prime Minister Modi of strengthening Regional Connectivity and generating employable workforce. His optimism for this scheme can be further assessed from the recent order of up to 50 Bombardier Q400 of SpiceJet. The Bombardier order will help create the single largest regional fleet in the country giving further impetus to the UDAN Scheme.
He has the dexterity to turn around distressed businesses and He has done the same more than once. Whether it was advising the government on revamping the loss-making Delhi Transport Corporation in 1996, re-launching Modiluft as revamped SpiceJet in 2005 or the recent “take-over” as the promoter of SpiceJet. SpiceJet has not looked back ever since, and has been profitable for 11 consecutive quarters with a load factor of over 90% for 32 months in a row (a global aviation record). SpiceJet’s turnaround story under the leadership of He, perhaps is unmatched in the global aviation space today.
Earlier on, as Officer on Special Duty (OSD) in the Telecom and IT ministry, He helped draft the National Telecom Policy and the Information Technology Act. He was instrumental in revolutionising the telecom industry in India. He has also served as an OSD to the then I&B Minister when he assisted to revamp the national broadcaster Doordarshan and played a key role in the launch of DD Sports and DD News.
He has a keen interest in sports and development of Indian sports has been on his mind and remains his key interest area. Fusion of his interest with nationalism has recently enabled his election as the President of the Boxing Federation of India. This is his first step on that path.
He is an alumnus of Delhi’s St. Columba’s school. He was awarded the Sword of Honour, the school’s highest award, presented to the student who excels in academics as well as sports and co-curricular activities. He is also alumni of prestigious Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, and Cornell University, USA with degree in Law (LLB) from University of Delhi.