salut0

Not to drag this into political territory, but I suspect that if OneWorld wants to attract a mainland Chinese airline they won’t be able to do that and have STARLUX as a full member as well.

hpmh

Quote:

Originally Posted by salut0

Not to drag this into political territory, but I suspect that if OneWorld wants to attract a mainland Chinese airline they won’t be able to do that and have STARLUX as a full member as well.

I mean, United has both EVA Air and Air China as Star Alliance partners.

AKLifetimeFlyer

Yet somehow Air China, Shenzhen Airlines, and Eva Air can still coexist in Star Alliance?

salut0

Touché; didn’t know that!

1353513636

IIRC Air China owns a very large stake in Shenzhen Airlines and there's probably some coordination that goes between the two. Pre-pandemic it was CA launching long haul services out of Shenzhen, not ZH.

angetenar

Likely the greater barrier to Starlux joining Oneworld is Cathay, who as a founding member has veto rights over new members joining. Neither of Air China and EVA were founding members of *A so while they may have had objections they did not have veto power.

ItsAnAdam

although I would note that unlike EVA and China Airlines, Starlux doesn’t currently serve mainland China. I doubt they’d ever agree to it but I could envision a scenario where they agree not to serve mainland China and in return CX lets them into oneworld.

or they go for a connect membership

username

EVA and China Airlines entered Star Alliance and SkyTeam after the Mainland Chinese carriers were already in the alliances. In fact, Air China sponsored / mentored EVA.

JX's founder was running EVA when EVA entered into Star Alliance, did Hello Kitty Jet, etc.

I think JX's strategy is "grow first so they can get better terms entering into agreements / alliances."

buylowsellhigh

Is there any info of when Starlux availability will appear onto AS booking system?

username

The cross-strait routes are highly contested. Mainland China is Taiwan's largest (> 40%) trading partner and people go back and forth all the time.

There is no Open Sky agreement between Taiwan and Mainland China. Taiwan has rules on how it allocates those routes and frequencies to its airlines. This is also part of the reason that EVA still has UNI (B7) and China Airlines still has Mandarin (AE) - more entities, more flights.

Starlux came much later. They also started operations on 23 January 2020, just as COVID started.

Even before COVID, Mainland China only allowed transit through TPE from very few second or third tier cities. This was because Mainland carriers did not want to lose the business to BR and CI, not politics. Right now, people holding the PRC passport are not allowed to fly to Taiwan without entry permit for Taiwan.

Starlux will focus on transit traffic with its limited fleet for now and there is a lot less barrier for O&D outside Mainland China right now.

AKLifetimeFlyer

SFO makes sense from a population and demographic sense, but Seattle would be much more ideal for connection purposes.

Tack

Same. OW being arguably the best alliance. As stated up thread, I’m hoping JX eventually ends up in OW. No such thing as too many Asian partners.

username

Looks like SFO year end and SEA mid 2024.

https://www.worldjournal.com/wj/stor...reaknews_index

StevenSeagalFan

I’ve heard rumbles from corporate management of displeasure with AA for essentially promising all these wonderful intl flights out of SEA and the new “WCIA” - West Coast International Alliance with AA, AS even hired a director of WCIA.

notquiteaff

Hey, they can always call up their buddies at Boeing and order up some 787s and do it themselves

#ProudlyAllBoeing