Kingfisher Airlines Limited is an airline group based in India. Its head office is in Andheri (East), Mumbai and Registered Office in UB City, Bangalore. Kingfisher Airlines, through its parent company United Breweries Group, has a 50% stake in low-cost carrier Kingfisher Red. The airline has been facing financial issues for many years. Until December 2011, Kingfisher Airlines had the second largest share in India's domestic air travel market. However due to the severe financial crisis faced by the airline, it has the lowest market share currently.

In May 2009, Kingfisher Airlines carried more than 1 million passengers, giving it the highest market share among airlines in India. Kingfisher also won the Skytrax award for India's best airline of the year 2011.

Kingfisher Airlines is also the sponsor of F1 racing outfit, Force India, which Vijay Mallya also owns.

Kingfisher Airlines was established in 2003. It is owned by the Bengaluru based United Breweries Group. The airline started commercial operations in 9 May 2005 with a fleet of four new Airbus A320-200s operating a flight from Mumbai to Delhi. It started its international operations on 3 September 2008 by connecting Bengaluru with London. The airline is currently going through some bankruptcy problems, forcing the airline to ground many destinations and aircraft.

Vijay Mallya (Kannada: ವಿಜಯ್ ಮಲ್ಯ; born on December 18, 1955 in Calcutta, West Bengal, India) is an industrialist and a second-time member of India's parliament. He is the chairman of the UB Group – one of India's largest conglomerates,^{[citation needed]} with diverse interests in brewing, distilling, aviation, pharmaceuticals, real estate, engineering, fertilizers, biotechnology and information technology.

He is the son of industrialist Vittal Mallya. He took over as the chairman of the company at the age of 28 after his father's sudden demise in 1983.

Mallya attended the La Martiniere, Calcutta boys school, and graduated with a Bachelor in Commerce degree from St. Xavier's College, Kolkata. While in college, Mallya was interning in his family businesses. After he graduated, he interned at the American part of Hoechst in the United States.^{[not in citation given]}

At the time of his father's death, Mallya was unanimously elected Chairman of United Breweries. As part of his modernisation bid, he consolidated the various companies under one umbrella group called the "UB Group", spun off non-core and loss-making businesses and focused on the core business of beverage alcohol.Kingfisher beer controls more than 50 per cent market share of India's beer market. The beer is available in 52 countries outside India and leads the way among Indian beers in the international market.United Spirits Ltd, the flagship of the UB Group, has achieved the historic milestone of selling 114 million cases, becoming the largest spirits company in the world by volume.