Airlines: Brand India Is Taking Off; The $375 million Jet IPO last week is just the latest sign that gloom has given way to euphoria in the Mumbai stock market.(Cover Story)

Byline: Jason Overdorf

The same day that "The Aviator" opened in theaters across India, homegrown flying entrepreneur Naresh Goyal debuted Jet Airways, India's first private air carrier, to rave reviews on the Bombay Exchange. In one of the first high-profile signs that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's moves to deregulate India's aviation industry are beginning to excite investors, the initial public offering of 1.7 million shares sold out within minutes last Friday, raising at least $375 million.

The successful IPO comes as Brand India is taking off. In the first 17 days of February alone, foreign fund managers invested $1.5 billion, and market watchers expect the 2005 total to reach $12 billion, up from $8.4 billion last year and $6.7 billion in 2003. Now, with three billion-dollar IPOs last year and nearly 10 companies with market values in excess of $10 billion, the gloom that once shrouded the Indian market has turned into euphoria, inspired by Singh's reforms. Late last year, for example, his administration succeeded in raising the cap on foreign investment in the aviation sector to 49 percent from 40 percent, and allowed domestic carriers to begin flying abroad. No airline is better positioned than Jet to exploit these opportunities.

When India began opening the skies to competition ...