Bangkok--27 Mar--CAPA
The UAE has struck important agreements with Australia and India in the past couple of weeks to significantly expand bilateral air services access.
"The regions emerging long-haul powerhouses, Emirates, Etihad and Qatar Airways, will rely heavily on continuing liberalisation of aviation access around the world to continue to meet their expansion goals", said Peter Harbison, Executive Chairman of the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation.
Dubai is further down the road to becoming a destination in its own right than Abu Dhabi (Etihads base) and Doha (Qatar Airways base) and therefore sixth freedom operations (connecting two sets of third/fourth freedom services over their hubs) are pivotal to the success of their business models.
The rapid expansion of these carriers is being felt across the globe. In Australia, for example, Emirates has quickly become the third largest foreign airline, overtaking the likes of Thai Airways and Malaysia Airlines, with a share of just under 7% in the 12 months ended 30-Jun-06. Singapore Airlines (11% of the Australian international market) and Air New Zealand (17%) are next in Emirates sights as it introduces 35 new weekly services by 2011, secured by the recent bilateral.
Etihad, which launched services to Sydney this week, was the major winner of new traffic rights to India and will launch new routes to Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram in May-07 and Jun-07, as well as boosting capacity to Delhi later in the year.
"Airports and passengers alike will hope the welcome map continues to be in place for the Gulfs fast-growing carriers. Competing airlines without the veil of government protection face no alternative but to continue to focus on cost reduction and efficiency", said Mr Harbison.
Note to editors: The upcoming Apr-07 edition of Aviation Analyst-Asia Pacific will focus on the outlook for Middle East aviation.