Mandala Airlines is looking at adopting the Tiger Airways brand name for its operations in Indonesia.

The carrier is working towards rebranding itself as TigerMandala, says its president director Paul Rombeek.

"We'll like to be Tiger Indonesia to be more consistent as a group, but the Mandala name has to stay so that's where we are," he adds.

Tiger bought a 33% stake in Mandala after a financial restructuring in the Indonesian airline. Mandala then restarted operations last April, after emerging from bankruptcy. It operates a fleet of seven Airbus A320s and plans to grow this to up to 25 aircraft by 2015.

Philippine carrier Seair, in which Tiger holds a 40% stake, has meanwhile applied to the country's Exchange Securities Commission to "do business under the name and style of Tiger [Airways]".

It is understood that both carriers want to take on the Tiger name so as to capitalise on the brand name in the region.

Tiger said in January that its focus is on bringing its Indonesian and Philippine affiliates back to profitability as the longer-term potential of both markets is promising.

Source: Air Transport Intelligence news