End of 2010: How can OneWorld's network improve?
 

Hey all. I'm curious to know people's thoughts: where do you feel OW has a gap in their service (country or region) and how do you think they can go about improving it?

Question 2: what airline should OW pursue next to become the next affiliate / full member*?
* (preferably not a well established affiliate with extensive code sharing as it is).

1. China - Hainan seems to be the last pick; get them in and then make them set up a hub in PEK and/or PVG
2. South America - retain LA, or there will be a huge gap
3. Africa ? - although I'm not sure it's so necessary; maybe AA could start serving Western Africa
4. Central Europe - finally!

A direct link between Africa and the Americas - North or South would be good. No real African airline option out there - so need AA or LA to come in.
Obvious other gap is China

I was thinking about Africa in general myself, but where particularly in West Africa are you thinking?

I think the fact that Comair operates on behalf of British Airways out of Johannesburg has the South covered. Sure, the network isn't as extensive as South African Airways, but it does cover the bigger cities down there. And North Africa is somewhat well with connections from IB, BA, and AB.

Maybe OW can try to open up Taiwan domestic routes, as well as adding KHH as one location. This can be done by inviting BR to join. BR's affinate can reach a brand new location - MFM (Macau)
Also, to improve connectivity in China, OW can try to persuade CX to hold more sharing of CA -> CA switch to Oneworld under the influence of CX's shareholder power.

I agree retaining LAN is one of the top priorities. Other than that OW needs to

- Improve SE Asia coverage.
- Improve N. America coverage. Although there's an improvement on the West Coast with AA's enhanced focus on LAX, AA still can't cover N. America on its own.

Unfortunatley AB tends to operates many of these routes to tourist destinations and some as seasonal or infrequent (1 or 2 times per week) which is not good for business.

BA also operates some of these flights out of LGW and not LHR, so transit traffic is not possible with these, plus their routes are not very extensive in this region.

1. Retain LAN (and hence bring in TAM) in South America - although that would keep out Gol...
2. JetBlue or WestJet in North America
3. The rumours about Gulf Air would make an interesting addition in the Middle East
4. Bring Aer Lingus back
5. Stop Qantas converting flights to Jetstar and hence out of OW
6. Do something in Asia. By the end of 2012 when the dust has settled, OW will have 3 carriers compared to 6 for ST (or 7 if China Eastern retains Shanghai Airlines as a separate brand) and 6 for *A. That leaves Malaysia (perennially rumoured for ST), Jet (again, rumoured for ST), Hainan (does CX want another OW hub so close to HKG?), Eva Air and Philippine Airlines.

Very difficult to find OW connections betwen Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Phillipines, Thailand. A strong region for Star Alliance.

You know what they say about having your cake...

Why not "and/or"?

Sorry I'm trying to count.

OW (3): CX, JL, __?
ST (6/7): CZ, KE, VN (future CI, MU/FM, GA)
*A (6): CA, NH, OZ, SQ, TG, __?

Are you counting IT and AI? Though India is an important market, it seems too far away from East and Southeast Asia to be lumped in with the above carriers, no?

Agreed that Hainan's current hub is too close to HKG, but it's on the mainland; see my comments above.

If LAN-TAM goes to *A, Gol might be an option for OW. But they may stay non-aligned or opt for ST, with their DL codeshares and AR joining ST.

Sure, why not.

Yes, was counting India as geographically part of Asia. Excluding them makes the numbers look even worse for OW.

Probably counting KA as a separate brand in Asia too?

If you'r adding JetBlue and Aer Lingus - both lower cost airlines although not total LCCs, why not add Jetstar as well. Given neither are 'premium' carriers may need the addition of a second oneworld tier but would add to the network

Because Jetstar IS a LCC! Paying OW membership fee will increase its cost base so they probably don't want to join

Quoting from Wikipedia
JetBlue
"JetBlue Airways Corporation is an American low-cost airline"
"JetBlue started by following Southwest's approach of offering low-cost travel, but sought to distinguish itself by its amenities, such as in-flight entertainment, TV on every seat and Satellite radio. In Neeleman's words, JetBlue looks "to bring humanity back to air travel."

Compared to Tiger, with *Class, ability to rent video units/ipads, limited interlining, ability to earn QF points on some fares, I would put Jetstar in a similar class.

Aerlingus
Aer Lingus withdrew from the Oneworld airline alliance on 31 March 2007, explained to be due to Aer Lingus' repositioning as a low-cost carrier

Do you have to pay for IFE on the other two? As you said, they are not total LCC.

Intra-Africa sucks from a *OWE* standpoint as you are logistically only able to visit one country in Africa unless you choose South Africa, which then allows MN to Zimbabwe/Zambia/Namibia/Mauritius.

Not really sure what carriers OW would look at for expansion though :confused:

Kenya Airways (KQ) would be a good choice but they're Skyteam.
Ethiopian (ET) is another good option, but they're set to join *A.
Air Nigeria (VK) is okay, not as good as KQ and ET, but it's alliance free. It was started as Virgin Nigeria but Virgin Group now has a minority stake in it (49%). Still does't seem that likely a choice.
@:-)I was excited at first to see that Eagle Air (H7) connects many BA destinations but then I noticed that they mostly fly 19 seater Turbolets (and that's as big as they go) and they even fly a 4 seater Cessna 206! Don't see this happening then...

Air Zimbabwe (UM) seems the best choice as a relatively large airline connecting many BA destinations.

The reality? I don't think there are any airlines in Africa that are both large enough and unaffiliated with Skyteam or *A. Royal Air Maroc or Tunisair might be nice...but they are in "Europe and the Middle East," so aren't really useful when it comes to the issue of *OWE*

You could but it's effectively CX and operates at the same hub. If you want to get from Beijing to Shanghai, hubbing through either HKG or NRT effectively excludes OW from your decision.

Yes. Key routes without any OW presence at the moment:

Beijing - Shanghai

Beijing- Seoul

Shanghai - Seoul

At least one can still gather CX Asia Miles with several Chinese carriers but alas no status miles.

Lure CA~ :p

Retain LAN is the big priority in my view because if they get LAN, TAM will most likely come and to snag an airline like TAM in a very large growing economy in Brazil will be key for OW.

OW needs to get up off their as$.... again!
 

Retaining LA is the the biggest priority for 2012. Losing LATAM combined with a potential lose of MX would spell disaster for OW in Latin America. What pisses me off is that AA/OW sat on the sidelines again when 30% of LA's shares where up for sale.

There are gaps in the USA. Try to fly around the Southeast. DL and US have comprehensive hubs in ATL and CLT, respectivly while you can't get from say CHS to ATL without going through MIA or CAE to anywhere without going through DFW.

I would love to see US and the CLT hub come on-board.

Need service between Asia and S.E. US. CX could easily extend its new ORD service to MIA (also an OW hub), similar to the HKG/YVR/JFK service. There's apparently sufficient S.E. US demand to Asia to support widebody service ATL/ICN 9x/week on KE. Additionally (being completely selfish), BOS/HKG nonstop would be nice. :D

Foreign Airlines are not allowed to operate Revenue Earning US Domestic flights YVR-JFK is International. Also you would have the added inconvenince of Immigration and Customs at Inital point of US arrival and as we all know this can be from 20 Mins to 2 Hours therefore totally impracticable for an Airline to schedule.

to solve the problem of not having Oneworld presense on these routes:
Beijing - Shanghai
Beijing- Seoul
Shanghai - Seoul

i think Oneworld can do this:
CX increase shares on CA -> persuade CA to switch to Oneworld (CX as sponsor) using shareholder's identity

I was thinking no local traffic ORD/MIA (MIA has C&I facilities), thus no problem with intra-US revenue segments, and no deplaning at ORD for C&I.

Agreed OW is WAY too conservative on this type of stuff. Though I think OW will get lucky and LAN will stay though this should have never happened if OW was smart. You would think the JAL less would have taught them something.

Dragonair codeshares on Air China flights within China and between China and Korea would be enough, if eligible for OW status miles.

It's the opposite way around. CA is majority shareholder in CX.

CX controls about 20% of CA and CA controls about 30% of CX, so I won't say that it's really that big a difference. Swire is still the largest shareholder of CX.

CA can get virtually unlimited credit at a discount, CX cannot.

The position of OW in Europe is also very small compared to *A. With LH and the affiliates *A has much more routes compared to BA and IB. For flights within Western Europe it's hard to find good connections if you're not leaving from UK or Spain. *A has a better network and strategically better hubs.
Would be good if OW could get some fortification there.
And Africa as stated before. Brussels Airlines would have been a good partner and has been codesharing with AA before untill off course it became one of the affiliates of LH.

Have you not heard that AB is joining oneworld?

Arik Air an alternative African Airline for Oneworld?
 

What about Arik Air, currently they are a 3 star airline; based on Skytrax review. Their seats are exactly the same as Kingfisher's A340, the airline is based in Nigeria; maybe an alternative to Air Nigeria and Air Zimbabwe
http://www.arikair.com/contenu/sites...usiness_01.jpg

Oops
 

Totally right, I forgot about that ^

but, due to this shareholder relationship among CA and CX, why CA still joins *A (LH sponsor) but not OW with CX?

Incompetence within OW. Just add CA to the long list of airlines that OW failed to recruit.

When CA first applied to join Star CX actually voted NO.

But CA chairman then the CAAC head made a very big noise in public which forced CX to rethink their position.

CA always wantted to join Star as the political tie with LH and UA, not to mention to many Chinese officials that Star is the Flag Carrier League.

That may be, but OW failed to lock up Hainan when they applied back in 2006. They said it was due to Hainans finances, but many know that CX protested.