The Saudi budget airline flynas is set for the long haul.
The low cost carrier (LCC) yesterday said that it plans to offer services to long-haul destinations including Paris and Kuala Lumpur.
Flynas made a start by launching services to Jakarta thrice a week from January 1.
The bulk of the airline’s Global Flight Routes programme will be rolled out from April. The move into the long-haul market was originally announced by the airline in November during the Dubai Airshow.
“The expansion of our flight routes to cover long-haul destinations in Europe, Asia and Africa is a key element of our strategy to lead the airline into a new chapter of aggressive growth,” said Raja Azmi, the chief executive of flynas.
The airline is targeting 20 million passengers by the end of 2020.
Flynas has carried more than 15 million passengers since its launch in 2007 and in 2013 alone it carried 3.3 million.
Sharjah-based Air Arabia offers services to longer-haul destinations including the UK and France, via its three hubs of Alexandria, Casablanca and Sharjah.
The budget airline announced in October that it would begin offering services to China this year, but has yet to disclose any further details.
The Dubai-based LCC flydubai is unlikely to follow suit into the long haul market, said Will Horton, a senior analyst at the Centre for Aviation (Capa).
“Given the presence of Emirates and cooperation between flydubai and Emirates, long-haul is not likely for flydubai, as [it] largely concentrates on thinner markets, leaving the big ones to Emirates,” he said.
Flydubai declined to comment.
Previous attempts by LCCs to enter the long-haul market in the Middle East have faced difficulties amid fierce competition with more established carriers.
“The Gulf carriers have scale and efficiency that translates to low operating costs, potentially lower than what a limited-scale LCC can achieve,” said Mr Horton.
Malaysia’s AirAsia X began offering services to Abu Dhabi from Kuala Lumpur in November 2009, only for the service to be suspended the following February. However, Mr Horton highlighted that flynas will have the advantage of a larger source market, encompassing Jeddah and domestic feeder flights, compared with the relatively small market of Abu Dhabi and Dubai traffic that AirAsia X was able to draw on.
Meanwhile, Etihad yesterday said that its Swiss subsidiary Etihad Regional, formerly Darwin Airline, had launched a four times per week service from its hub in Geneva to Stuttgart.
Darwin was rebranded last month, after Etihad acquired a 33.3 per cent stake in the airline in November.
jeverington@thenational.ae