Executives talk about growth and opportunities
AIR NEW ZEALAND BUOYED BY INTERNATIONAL DEMAND Air New Zealand expects international capacity to be above 90% of 2019 levels by July amid soaring demand for air travel.
Speaking at Routes Asia 2023, Air New Zealand head of network planning Ashleigh Walsh said there continues to be strong appetite for leisure and VFR travel since New Zealand reopened its borders in July 2022.
“We’re forecast to reach about 93% by July this year in terms of international capacity—we’ve really been blown out of the water by the levels of demand we’re seeing,” she said.
OAG Schedules Analyser shows that the airline plans to operate about 450,000 international seats in February 2023, equivalent to 75% of pre-pandemic levels. Aside from Australia, the US, Japan and Singapore are now the carrier’s largest overseas markets.
“Since borders reopened with no restrictions, people are very keen to get out,” Walsh said. “There has been a lot of revenge travel and we’re not seeing it slowing down. That has been amplified by the lack of international capacity from other carriers coming to New Zealand, so demand for us is very strong.”
Air New Zealand increased service to China earlier this month, adding a fourth weekly flight between Auckland (AKL) and Shanghai Pudong (PVG). The move increased capacity on the route from around 1,800 two-way weekly seats to more than 2,400.
Air New Zealand operates 15 long-haul routes, including service to US gateways Houston George Bush (IAH), Los Angeles (LAX) and New York John F Kennedy (JFK).
– David Casey
NOK AIR SIGNS HYDERABAD AGREEMENT Thailand-based ultra-LCC Nok Air and India’s Hyderabad Airport (HYD) have inked an agreement that will see Nok start flights from Bangkok Don Mueng (DMK) to the Indian city from Feb. 21.
Nok Air will start with 3X-weekly nonstop flights during the winter 2022/23 season before increasing to 4X-weekly in the summer season, using Boeing 737-800s.
This will be Nok’s first Indian destination since the pandemic. Before the crisis it operated DMK-Guwahati (GAU) in 2019.
CAPA data shows Nok has 13 737-800s in service and another eight 737 MAX 8s on order.
CEO Wutthiphum Jurangkool said the airline would receive the first aircraft within the next two years and they will potentially be used on routes such as India, North Asia and Northern China.
– Chen Chuanren
CHINA MARKET REMAINS ‘VITAL’ FOR FINNAIRFinnair is seeking to reestablish itself in the Chinese market as it gradually rebuilds an Asian network that has been severely constrained by COVID travel restrictions and the closure of Russian air space.
The oneworld alliance member operated passenger flights from Helsinki (HEL) to six destinations in mainland China during the northern summer 2019 season, offering 28 flights per week and some 17,000 two-way seats. However, the airline’s network has been reduced to just one route, with two roundtrips per week to Shanghai Pudong (PVG).
“The Chinese part of our network has been very complicated due to the regulations they’ve had in place, and we’ve had to longstop aircraft because of crew constraints,” Finnair head of network strategy and development Aaron McGarvey said at Routes Asia 2023.
“It was very, very difficult during COVID and, following that, with the airspace closure. But now we’re more freely able to add capacity to China we will look at increasing that as we can. It remains a vital market and we hope to get it going again by mid to late this year.”
Before the pandemic, Finnair’s business model focused on connecting Europe and Asia using the shorter northern route over Russia. The carrier temporarily altered the strategy in response to COVID travel restrictions—focusing on North America—but Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent closure of Russian airspace has rendered many Asian routes financially unviable.
McGarvey said the closure has added three to four hours for each leg, which “completely violates” Finnair’s hub structure in Helsinki.
Although McGarvey said China will continue to be part of the carrier’s network, he pointed out Chinese carriers will have a competitive advantage over European carriers because they continue to overfly Russia.
“Largely speaking, a lot of the European airlines won't be able to offer prices that Chinese carriers can purely because of cost of operation. As a reference point, it’s anything from 30% to 50% more per rotation.”
TAT EYES TOURISM GROWTH FROM AFAR As part of its ABCD Fast Forward campaign, the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) is looking to attract more visitors from further afield.
With the reopening of markets, Thailand is seeing a robust recovery this year. In 2022, Thailand received 11 million visitors; this year, in January alone, there were 2 million. The top markets for international visitors include India, Malaysia, Singapore, the UK, US and Russia.
Speaking at the Routes Asia 2023 conference, Siripakorn Cheawsamoot, TAT’s deputy governor of international marketing for Europe, Africa, Middle East and Americas, said the target for this year is to bring in 25 million travelers, but more importantly, also high-value tourism revenue of $42.8 billion.
ABCD stands for airline focused, big cities and beyond, collaboration is key, and destination for all. Included in the plan is an expansion of source markets from destinations like the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Russia and South Africa.
With Bangkok Suvarnabhumi (BKK) Airport lacking the manpower and capacity to handle much larger arrivals, Siripakorn said TAT was also looking to alternative secondary cities within Thailand and in other countries, such as South Korea’s Jeju, Vietnam’s Da Nang and Malaysia’s Sabah hubs.
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