COPA orders 61 B737MAXs

Copa Airlines based out of Panama in South America has officially announced that it has placed its largest ever order for aircraft with Boeing worth $6.6 billion. The aircraft ordered is for a combination of both B738MAX and B739MAX with the breakdown per aircraft type not mentioned though!

Currently, CM's fleet consists of 17 B737-700s + 26 E90s + 56 B738s. The B737s are being replaced with B738s in a phased manner from this summer onwards. The B739MAXs ordered will be used to replace the B738s on the most popular medium haul routes such as those to JFK, MIA, EZE, GRU and GIG.

Cathay Pacific considering Barcelona flights

Media reports emanating out of Hong Kong have suggested that Cathay Pacific is looking to add two additional long haul destinations in 2015 as it looks to take advantage of niche markets that provide good O&D + onward feed potential. The two routes identified are Barcelona and Mexico City effective November 2015. No indication has been provided regarding frequencies per week nor which aircraft type would be used to operate.

Source: http://www.businesstraveller.asia/asia-pacific/news/cathay-adds-barcelona,-mexico-city,-reduces-chi

CX also officially disclosed that it will be reducing its services to ORD-Chicago from the on set of the IATA S15 season from the current 10 weekly to daily nonstop using a B77W.

Comments:

Launching BCN is a well thought out move, as demand to Asia from this city over the past three years has rapidly grown in particular to China, Seoul and Japan so CX is well positioned to take advantage of that + there is good amount of O&D traffic to the HKG hub. In addition, BCN is a mini hub for its fellow One World partner i.e. Iberia so CX can code share via BCN to Latin America + Europe to gain additional feeder traffic. Comparing demand between BCN and MAD to SE Asia in 2014 is as follows:

HKG - 59K vs 35K
NRT - 130K vs 90K
HND - 26K vs 16K
PVG - 79K vs 85K
PEK - 51K vs 55K
ICN - 90K vs 101K
MNL - 23K vs 29K
SYD - 22K vs 16K
MEL - 19K vs 17K
BKK - 40K vs 70K
SIN - 45K vs 12K
KUL - 10K vs 11K
SGN - 4K vs 5K
CAN - 11K vs 14K
HAN - 3K vs 5K

Total is 612,000 versus 561,000 in favor of BCN + more importantly HKG O&D traffic (the highest form of yield) is far greater for BCN along with the fact that cargo demand to/from BCN is higher than MAD to/from Asia. Therefore seeing how they launched MAN-HKG with 4 weekly flights initially, one can for see the same being adopted for HKG-BCN initially. But in all fairness, both BCN and MAD can easily be sustained by CX four to five times per week using a B77W or A359 in the future.

China Southern increases Los Angeles capacity

China Southern Airlines based out of Guangzhou, China has officially announced that it will be significantly increasing its presence in the LAX market place effective 19JUN onwards. 

Frequencies will be raised from daily to 11 weekly nonstop flights operated by an A380 daily + 4 weekly B77W. The carrier looks to tap into the ever increasing CAN/HKG/Shenzen corridor traffic segment as well as further aggressively poach away traffic from other airlines that is bound to SIN, MNL, PEK, PVG, BKK, DEL and KUL.

Emirates increases Copenhagen and Zurich

Emirates has officially announced that it will be significantly increasing capacity on two of its European routes from this winter season in the below mentioned manner:

Zurich - capacity increase to double daily A380s effective 01OCT due to strong demand especially for its premium cabin classes on this sector.

Copenhagen - capacity increased from daily B77W to daily A380. The A380 to be used for CPH will be in the new two class configuration seating 615 pax i.e. 58J + 557Y !

Comments:

EK will be receiving 4 dual class A380s this winter and CPH has been the first destination announced for the whale jet. This configuration makes it the largest passenger airplane in service today (seats wise) beating the 560 pax B747-400 previously in service with JAL/ANA.

The other destinations that one would expect EK sending the dual class A380 on are Mauritius, Manila, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok and Jakarta.  

Turkish increases its A330 fleet size

Turkish Airlines has officially announced to the Istanbul Stock Exchange, that it has secured on a long term dry lease 5 additional A330s of which the main highlights are as follows:

• Three A330-200s (22J+228Y config) will be leased from Wells Fargo Bank which will bring the total A332 fleet to number 20 units.
• Two brand new A330-300s (ex Afriqiyah Airways of Libya) will be leased for 8 years. These will be configured in TK's standard 28J+261Y configuration and will result in the A333 fleet number to rise to 21 units currently!

Comments:

With the lifting of Iran sanctions imminent, one should not be surprised to see TK rapidly ramping up its flights to the various destinations it serves there as well as possibly launch new 3-4 weekly nonstop flights to DTW-Detroit, USA to cater for the large number of Lebanese, Iranian, Iraqi, Jordanian, Egyptians residing in Michigan state.  

Qatar Airways increases Indonesia flights

Qatar Airways has officially announced that they will be significantly increasing its services to Indonesia from July 2015 onwards in the below mentioned manner:

Jakarta - frequencies increased to triple daily nonstop flights using an A332 double daily + B77W daily

Bali - frequencies increased from daily to double daily nonstop flights using a B788 for all flights

Comments:

The increase of services to DPS-Bali will definitely help increase S/F on its European bound services as that is the main target market along with Dubai and Jeddah. In addition, it also gives a competitive edge to QR by operating double daily to the island city as Emirates has announced that they are launching new DPS-DXB services on a daily basis using a B77W from June too.

With regards to the Indonesia country itself, if QR is given more bilateral access, it should seriously look at serving SUB-Surbaya airport nonstop from DOH at least four times per week using an A332 initially as it is nice little niche market having the second largest urban population (9 million) along with high labor demand to GCC/KSA in particular.