According to a PTI report, issues related to Air India joining the Star Alliance are likely to be discussed by Arvind Jadhav, CMD, Air India, who is currently in Brussels to attend a meeting of the global airlines body. Air India's entry into the Star Alliance was given a nod in December 2007, but its formal admission into the elite club of major global airlines has been deferred time and again due to a host of requirements not being fulfilled. The airline has set a deadline of June 2010 for its formal entry into the alliance, which is an inter-line commercial pact among world carriers to providing passengers wider choices for air travel and related facilities. Other competing alliances are the One World and SkyTeam.

Among the major requirements which Air India has to fulfill is the common flight code, which continues to be AI for Air India and IC for the erstwhile Indian Airlines even two years after their merger. A single code is required for an airline to serve several purposes, including ticketing. While Air India has claimed that most of the requirements have been fulfilled, another major issue relates to the selection of a new reservation system or Passenger Service System (PSS) which is 'critical' to the process of joining the Star Alliance. Selection of firms to work on this new system is yet to take place, though the tender evaluation was completed two months ago.