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End of the line for MH longhaul?

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Old Apr 30, 2015, 5:49 am
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End of the line for MH longhaul?

Seems they will only have aircraft to concentrate on routes within Asia and to Australia soon enough. They are putting their entire A380/777 fleet up for sale/lease. And the A330's do not have the legs to fly to europe.

Sad :-(

http://leehamnews.com/2015/04/30/mal...restructuring/
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Old Apr 30, 2015, 7:23 am
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Originally Posted by bananahead
They are putting their entire A380/777 fleet up for sale/lease.
That's not quite correct. All six A380s are up for sale or lease but only four of their 13 B772s are being sold.
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Old Apr 30, 2015, 7:38 am
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MH had already announced previously that all their 777's will leave the fleet by DEC 2016. I believe the four mentioned in the linked article are the four owned by the airline, the remained being returned to the lessors. The original plan was to have an 'all airbus' long haul fleet - A380 and A330 only. But now the A380's are leaving also leaving only the A330's.
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Old Apr 30, 2015, 8:23 am
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They are going to focus on the China, India, Australian markets to support domestic tourism for the long haul.

They are also selling off their cargo division and assets and aircraft (some relatively new) and will be cutting 5000-6000 employee's from the current numbers. The exodus of pilots, cabin crew and engineers has begun...emirates, etihad and Korean Air have just concluded road shows in Kuala Lumpur targeting MH staff/crews to recruit for their own fleets given how good a reputation MH pilots and crew have.

It's a sad day but..neccessary if the airline is to survive.

Wonder if it means they are also giving up their KUL-London route as well.
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Old Apr 30, 2015, 9:11 am
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I believe the airline will sell/lease back to keep at least 2 A380 for the London route. That way they don't have to outright own the aircraft and they can still use them while leasing. They're aiming for 2016 anyway..
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Old Apr 30, 2015, 4:31 pm
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Govt interference/insistence on flying to vanity destinations, ME3 competition on Kangaroo routes, discount carrier eating away at short haul... and the twin disasters didn't help matters at all.

The blueprint for restructuring was announced earlier this year and I hope MH can bounce back and become a much more focused regional Asian carrier.
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Old Apr 30, 2015, 4:34 pm
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Originally Posted by Guy Betsy
I believe the airline will sell/lease back to keep at least 2 A380 for the London route. That way they don't have to outright own the aircraft and they can still use them while leasing. They're aiming for 2016 anyway..
Do they really need the A380 for KUL-LHR? If they are going to lease two frames just to operate the route, might as well go for a pair of 77W. Leasing companies have plenty of delivery slots in 2017 and 2018.

Unless of course they just can't find buyers for the A380, in which case, I guess they will keep flying 2 A380s and park the rest in the desert...
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Old Apr 30, 2015, 4:46 pm
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Originally Posted by bzcat
Do they really need the A380 for KUL-LHR? If they are going to lease two frames just to operate the route, might as well go for a pair of 77W. Leasing companies have plenty of delivery slots in 2017 and 2018.

Unless of course they just can't find buyers for the A380, in which case, I guess they will keep flying 2 A380s and park the rest in the desert...
Don't think they can afford to 'park' any aircraft in the desert at this point in time. Their cash flow situation is piss poor and they need all the cash they can pull in now..

It's still a good airline but they need to take some serious actions to stop the bleeding (i.e overheads).

They nee to dispose of assets and get rid of aircraft they simply do not need off the books asap. If they plan on a proper turn around come 2018.
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Old May 1, 2015, 4:51 pm
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Originally Posted by wolf72
Don't think they can afford to 'park' any aircraft in the desert at this point in time. Their cash flow situation is piss poor and they need all the cash they can pull in now..

It's still a good airline but they need to take some serious actions to stop the bleeding (i.e overheads).

They nee to dispose of assets and get rid of aircraft they simply do not need off the books asap. If they plan on a proper turn around come 2018.
Cash flow is exactly my point... if they are not cash flow positive now with A380, parking it may be better than flying it if they can't find any buyer for the A380s.
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Old May 1, 2015, 10:17 pm
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Originally Posted by bzcat
Cash flow is exactly my point... if they are not cash flow positive now with A380, parking it may be better than flying it if they can't find any buyer for the A380s.
Word coming out from Kuala Lumpur today. They are going to keep the Paris route and use a 777 for that sector which I assume means the London route as well will see the 777 being used for this sector as well.
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Old May 2, 2015, 12:17 am
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Originally Posted by wolf72
Word coming out from Kuala Lumpur today. They are going to keep the Paris route and use a 777 for that sector which I assume means the London route as well will see the 777 being used for this sector as well.
Not too sure if they going to do any better to operate 777 if they didn't retrofit the cabin.
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Old May 2, 2015, 10:46 am
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Originally Posted by soonyeap
Not too sure if they going to do any better to operate 777 if they didn't retrofit the cabin.
That's true.
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Old May 2, 2015, 8:03 pm
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Originally Posted by wolf72
Word coming out from Kuala Lumpur today. They are going to keep the Paris route and use a 777 for that sector which I assume means the London route as well will see the 777 being used for this sector as well.
BA are restarting their KL route, announced some time ago, so maybe not for London? Seemed a bit odd at the time, as who would choose an B772 (old cabin if 3 class is used) over a A380, but I guess this move was in the pipeline for the last 6 months, and as One World partners it would make sense.
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Old May 2, 2015, 11:18 pm
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Longhaul MH traffic has a lot of pax transitting in KUL to other Asian destinations. They filled their A380 in J with attractive pricing. But with the old seats on the 777 that will not work anymore. Apparently, they plan to keep two A380 for LHR and probably a single flight, but with BA reopening the route....
BTW, I just flew HKG-KUL on MH J. My early morning flight was cancelled and I was rescheduled on the early afternoon flight; very inconvenient. The 737 was a very old one with antique J seats. We were handed out a small portable video player with a dozen movies, some could not show the last 15 minutes of the movie (tried two portable). Both MH and CX have four daily flights. CX is more expensive but uses mostly longhaul 330s with flat J seats and excellent avod. How can MH expect to compete, except on price? This is sad because their regional J lounge in KUL is quite nice.
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Old May 3, 2015, 1:32 am
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Originally Posted by brunos
Longhaul MH traffic has a lot of pax transitting in KUL to other Asian destinations. They filled their A380 in J with attractive pricing. But with the old seats on the 777 that will not work anymore. Apparently, they plan to keep two A380 for LHR and probably a single flight, but with BA reopening the route....
BTW, I just flew HKG-KUL on MH J. My early morning flight was cancelled and I was rescheduled on the early afternoon flight; very inconvenient. The 737 was a very old one with antique J seats. We were handed out a small portable video player with a dozen movies, some could not show the last 15 minutes of the movie (tried two portable). Both MH and CX have four daily flights. CX is more expensive but uses mostly longhaul 330s with flat J seats and excellent avod. How can MH expect to compete, except on price? This is sad because their regional J lounge in KUL is quite nice.

Those old 737-800's are nasty...and so run down. I know what you mean.
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