Originally Posted by
bobbybrown
AY wanted to do codeshare with KE or OZ for the new HEL-ICN route, but it seems they failed. I doubt AY can sustain this route for a long time since they don't have any alliance advantage, and Seoul-Europe market is highly competitive - there are a lot of cheap fares. Looks like 5/week is too much.
I would expect AY also try to establish some codeshares on JL metal to NRT and NGO on the days no non-stop flights from HEL are offered. Maybe there will be some additional codeshare destinations in Japan as well. Kagoshima, Komatsu and Niigata being among the JL ex-ICN destinations.
Otherwise, I think AY will rely heavily on Korean biz and leisure pax to Scandinavia, Russia and the Baltics and vice versa. There might be some advantage flying ICN-HEL-ARN instead of ICN-CDG/FRA/LHR-ARN for example.
Anyway, OW could do worse than take a close look at one of the emerging Korean low cost carriers and maybe build up a sort of Korean BMI for domestic connections and routes to China.