Air Mauritius - History

History

The company was set up on 14 June 1967 by Air France, the BOAC enterprise, and the Government of Mauritius, with a 27.5% stake each; the balance was held by Rogers and Co. Ltd., the general sales agent for Air France and BOAC within Mauritius.

In the beginning, the carrier operated international services in conjunction with Air France, Air India and British Airways, which jointly had a 25% holding in Air Mauritius at that time. Until 1972, the company restricted its activities to ground services only; it started flight operations in its own right in August 1972 with a six-seater Piper PA-31 Navajo aircraft leased from Air Madagascar, connecting Mauritius with Rodrigues. In 1973, a wet-leased Vickers VC10 from British Airways enabled the company to launch a long-haul route to London via Nairobi. Likewise, long-range operations in its own right started on 1 November 1977, using a Boeing 707 wet-leased from British Airtours.

During the 1970s and 1980s, long-haul routes were operated with Boeing 707s and Boeing 747 SPs. These aircraft have been gradually replaced with Boeing 767s and Airbus A340s, introduced in 1988 and 1994, respectively. African medium-haul routes started utilising the Airbus A319 following its delivery in 2001, and ATR 42s and ATR 72s were introduced in 1987 and 2002, respectively, to operate inter-island services.

In 1995, the company was listed on the stock exchange of Mauritius. As of 31 March 2012 (2012 -03-31), shareholders having more than 5% of participation in the airline are Air Mauritius Holdings (51%) and the government of Mauritius (8.4%), while other investors hold another 21.9% stake in the company. It employs a staff 2,761 strong (at March 2007).

The airline has the Paille-en-Queue, a fish-eating tropical bird, as its symbol.