Skyteam is chasing Jet Airways

[sn26567]

According to French economic newspaper La Tribune, Skyteam is looking for a partner in India. With Air India going to Star Alliance and Kingfisher married with oneworld, there remain only two large Indian companies: Jet Airways and low-cost Indigo Airlines.

But Jet Airways has a partnership with Brussels Airlines, a Star Alliance member, at its Brussels hub. If Jet Airways joins Skyteam, it will mean the end of the partnership with Brussels Airlines and the end of Brussels Airport as a Jet Airways hub between India and North America? according to La Tribune.

[Bralo20]

If 9W joins Skyteam then we can indeed say goodbye to them at BRU... But then can 9W also say goodbye to every deal they have with *A members... And since they just extended their partnership with United Airlines I really doubt they would join Skyteam...

But you'll never know...

[RoMax]

It's logical Skyteam will fight for Jet as they are the only big international airline in India left. But as Jet just launched a really big codeshare agreement with UA with the message that they will expand it later... 9W searched for a new partner because they will lost AA to Kingfisher going to Oneworld, they could chose Delta, US, CO/United and they chosed UA. If they would go for Skyteam for the moment they would chose Delta, because this isn't a kind of codeshare to end after only a few months.

[airbuske]

It seems that AF-KLM , Delta , Alitalia and Jet Airways are talking about a big agreement to cooperate
before entering Skyteam.

And AF-KLM is negotiating with Jet Airways to move their hub from Brussels to Amsterdam.
That means that all agreements with the American carriers that are flying from Brussels to US would move to KLM.

[Jazzy]

This could be a nice opportunity for SN to start transatlantic flights.

[RoMax]

Bye bye Jet Airways. In an article I've found about it they speak about March/April to sign the contract, but probably a bit later because of India (India has to give it's permission for almost everything). The alliance should be operational in 2012 and than Jet Airways could join Skyteam.

The other side of the story is that this gives much more opportunities to SN for TATL flights (New York, maybe even Toronto?)

[Airbus A330]

And any chance to see Air India starting a BOM-BRU or a DEL-BRU route ?

[airtrotter]

SN and LH (and *A) will be watching this very closely.
Is it reasonable to believe they are already preparing things to implement when 9W will indeed leave BRU?

Of course, what are the numbers of pax 9W is carrying now between BRU and JFK/EWR/YYZ (excl. the Indian originating pax, cause those will be lost to AMS) ?

Or will they just rely on the new UA and AC (with codeshares) for traffic to/from US and Canada?

[RoMax]

Air India has plans to relaunch the routes to Manchester (and even Birmingham), I think they should better look at Belgium when Jet will leave. I'm quite sure Jet has created a market for some non-stop Belgium-India flights in those years. For exemple the diamond market will not be happy if they lose the non-stop flights to India and you can be sure these pax are prepared to pay quite a lot of money for their flights (I'v heard the "diamond people" were almost the only pax flying in First class when 9W still operated the B77W to BRU).

And I think SN should look at Toronto before AC will take this market. Even with 9W, AC would eventually have decoupled Toronto and Montreal and without 9W they will do it even faster if SN is not fast enough.

[Conti764]

Air India has plans to relaunch the routes to Manchester (and even Birmingham), I think they should better look at Belgium when Jet will leave. I'm quite sure Jet has created a market for some non-stop Belgium-India flights in those years. For exemple the diamond market will not be happy if they lose the non-stop flights to India and you can be sure these pax are prepared to pay quite a lot of money for their flights (I'v heard the "diamond people" were almost the only pax flying in First class when 9W still operated the B77W to BRU).

And I think SN should look at Toronto before AC will take this market. Even with 9W, AC would eventually have decoupled Toronto and Montreal and without 9W they will do it even faster if SN is not fast enough.

I doubt the Belgium-India market is big enough for such flight. Most people on board 9W used BRU as transfer hub only. LH will happily take care of the Belgium-India market via their long haul flights

[sn26567]

If Finnair is capable of having direct flights between Helsinki and Delhi, Brussels Airlines should be able to do the same from Brussels.

During Sabena times there was also a non-stop flight between Chennai and Brussels. It shows that there is a market, even if it means promoting connecting flights at Brussels.

[Conti764]

And AF-KLM is negotiating with Jet Airways to move their hub from Brussels to Amsterdam.

Fair enough, there is no reason for 9W whatsoever to maintain their BRU operations.

But I doubt they will get the same level of cooperation they enjoyed in their years at BRU. But then again, KLM only flies to DEL, so there is some integration possible with each others flights.

What would this mean for BRU? How many pax will they loose?

[euroflyer]

hm, IF the reports regarding Jet and AF/KL are correct I am quite sure that LH/SN will already be working on their answer. So I can very well imagine that LH would shift additional a/c to SN to offer flights to India and / or transatlantic flights IF, and this is again the big IF, those airplanes can on those routes not only make money, but IF they can make more money on those routes than htey would do on other long-haul routes in the "LH world" with LH itself from FRA or MUC or with OS from VIE, LX from ZRH etcetera. *Alliance is a close partnership, but I would expect LH to try to move faster here with SN than maybe AC or Air India would be to pick up those markets. But again, only if LH feels that they can make more money here than somewhere else ...

[Conti764]

If Finnair is capable of having direct flights between Helsinki and Delhi, Brussels Airlines should be able to do the same from Brussels.

During Sabena times there was also a non-stop flight between Chennai and Brussels. It shows that there is a market, even if it means promoting connecting flights at Brussels.

We all know Sabena was not famous for it's high profits on many flights.

About Finnair... They are not a member of the worlds biggest alliance with soon an Indian airline in it who flies to all surrounding airport, nor are they partially and soon to be fully owned by Europe's major airline which flies to no less then 7 Indian airports itself.

Sorry, but I just don't see how SN could hold an India flight on its own with the above in mind. LH will fly BRU pax to their hubs and fly them to the destination they need. It's easier for LH's and SN's customer base to fly from BRU to any of the LH India bases through one of the German LH hubs then to fly with SN to the sole destination the airline might have in India and fly from there to their final destination, even with AI as partner. LH will choose to keep those few pax 'in house' rather then give them to another airline (Air India) even though they are both members of the same alliance.

When 9W will leave BRU, the only opportunity I see for SN is transatlantic and only to select markets.

[kookongsi]

If 9W moves their hub to AMS or another airport my guess is that they would keep at least a flight to Mumbai and maybe, maybe one to Delhi. I don't think they would give up all at BRU.

[sn26567]

Interesting article in La Tribune, a French financial newspaper: http://www.latribune.fr/actualites/econ ... -inde.html

- 9W has more links with Star than with Skyteam. It would be difficult to change all this
- Air France/KLM absolutely want an ally in India. Initially it should have been IndiGo, but they prefer 9W
- The hub will be AMS and not Paris because 9W doesn't fly to Paris
- The Indian government could still oppose the move to protect Air India

[BrightCedars]

What's the proportion of BE/IN O&D traffic on 9W's BRU network? What's the proportion of IN-EU-Africa traffic as well? Insignificant together (SN and LH know the answer)? Don't bother playing with it. All other needs are covered via FRA (IN-EU, IN-US, IN-BE). And we already know SN will cross the Atlantic on its own metal one day.

[regi]

and slots? Nobody brings this cost on the table.
Add the cost of setting up an entire office at AMS, and the closure cost of the Brussels office
Indian people are known to be good in IT. So I think that they will fill in their Excel sheet very well before making a decision.

[RoMax]

- 9W has more links with Star than with Skyteam. It would be difficult to change all this
- Air France/KLM absolutely want an ally in India. Initially it should have been IndiGo, but they prefer 9W
- The hub will be AMS and not Paris because 9W doesn't fly to Paris
- The Indian government could still oppose the move to protect Air India

and slots? Nobody brings this cost on the table.
Add the cost of setting up an entire office at AMS, and the closure cost of the Brussels office
Indian people are known to be good in IT. So I think that they will fill in their Excel sheet very well before making a decision.

The costs to replace everthing they have with Star and BRU will be high, but if the Indian government doesn't want to give permission to 9W to join Star the costs for 9W can end even higher if they stay allone. So it is getting permission fast to join Star or joining Skyteam. Jet said it themself, they want Star but they will not wait forever, if the Indian government can't agree with 9W joining star, 9W will not wait even if the costs will be high. And when they join Star it doesn't make any sense to keep a big hub at a Star Alliance airport.

[geoffrey11]

It is very regrettable that Jet Airways goes away from Brussels and go to the Sky-Team alliancie. But that makes SN-LH again stronger in North America. And SN have the opportunity to fy to North-America. Jet Airways will know that KLM-AFR fly already in America and India. Last year around september had LH a big order with Airbus. Including a number of A330-300, olso there was a lot for Swiss int. replaced of the older-200 series in the fleet. Maby we can have the -200 series... But maby 9W will not stop flying, and will they fly from Delhi and Mombay to Brussels. But 9W was better than Air India and I think that AI not will fly to Brussels. I gonne miss the busy morning on the B-pier