ScandiGB

DXB, DOH, BKK, SIN etc have some things in common.
1. There are a lot more people flying on those routes from Scandinavia than the respective home markets.
2. Only a relatively small part of the Scandinavians flying on those routes have those airports as their final destination.
3. The carriers in those airports can offer onward connections to a large number of relevant final destinations from those airports.
4. Passengers originating in ARN have a lot fewer direct opportunities in Asia than the city pairs (PEK, BKK, SIN) have in Europe. Consequently the opportunity for SAS to connect passengers from those destinations to the rest of Europe is comparatively small.
5. Consequently it makes less sense for SAS to fly to BKK than it does for Thai to fly to ARN. SAS can’t bring passengers to the final destination in south east Asia or holiday destination as efficiently as Thai can, and there is not the same opportunity to bring Thai based people to Europe.

ScandiGB

If anything that is a simplistic and probably not accurate way of viewing the world.

GUWonder

It’s a way of viewing an airline like SAS. And time will tell how accurate that is for SAS.

WindowSeatFlyer

Let's hope SAS figures out the extra fuel tank setup and routes better than Aer Lingus, which has pulled the A321LR off the DUB-IAD route (3,000 nm) because of range issues during the winter months.

GUWonder

KL seems to have managed to do what SAS hasn’t, and KL has a very substantial route network to a wide variety of countries.

Even with SK getting the A321LRs, I would be surprised if SAS ends up geared to do a whole lot more than ending up with hunkering down with CPH and the US as its last great hope in long-haul service. I wouldn’t even be shocked to see SAS do something approaching a replay of Norwegian when it comes to long-haul service out of ARN. The A321LRs SK will allow it to play a bit more out of the DL and CO/UA playbook, but SK seems to not be geared toward a vastly changed outlook when it comes to the marketplace for long-haul services to/from Scandinavia; and so I expect more of the same from SAS rather than some revolutionary change in where it goes.

SAS was way more of a global airline decades ago than it is now. Nowadays, I doubt that SK’s corporate/management culture and home market are of such disposition as would enable SK to be way more global or to even return SK to being at least as global as it used to be.

I mean this half-jokingly, but SK’s like a healthier version of LOT but with more expensive employees. I could go into how ARN/CPH/OSL are increasingly like WAW, but I’ll save that for another time and place.

The A321LRs won’t be able to save SK in a marketplace where other carriers have the same kind of planes as SK while having lower variable operating costs than SK.

And whats SK going to do with a flood of 757 like issues faced by UA/CO when serving Scandinavia? Are they going to try to claim EC261/2004 doesn’t apply?

GUWonder

Having seen more than my fair share of disruptions with UA/CO 757 service to Scandinavia especially, I hope so too.

WindowSeatFlyer

Per Airbus' marketing material: "The A321LR variant provides extended range for the A320neo Family’s longest fuselage version, able to fly routes of up to 4,000 nm with 206 passengers by utilising extra fuel in three Additional Centre Tanks (ACTs)."

Since routes like ARN-EWR is very close to 4,000 nm, it doesn't seem like SAS would be able to use it for a lot of transatlantic routes from ARN. Basing them at CPH would increase the number of feasible routes.

ARN-EWR is 3,400 nm and ARN-IAD is 3,600 nm, so hopefully the A321LR won't have the same issues between Scandinavia and the US east coast, assuming all ACTs are fitted (but as noted above, EI has decided to not operate DUB-IAD with the A321LR, presumably because they haven't fitted all three ACTs)

ScandiGB

KL has the very clear advantage of having 15-20million people for whom their main hub is the nearest airport. It is comparable to the population in all of Scandinavia.

From a population perspective their main hub is comparable to LHR and CDG.

No airport in Scandinavia has even a quarter of that population in its close proximity.

GUWonder

I know the population figures and geographic breakdowns very well.

KL made itself what it is by making AMS its massive hub and not counting primarily on home-market demand to make its global network so very extensive. SAS has failed in this regard, even as there are plenty of excuses for why SAS is how it is.

In other words, it’s not just DOH/DXB/SIN that have managed to make a long-haul network very global despite having limited local demand to support such major global route networks.

And ARN doesn’t really work very well for an SK hub for long-haul traffic at this point. SAS has already failed in that regard and the A321LR is unlikely to provide a long-term strength for SK long-haul service at ARN. And SAS has already shown in various ways that it’s a believer in hunkering down with CPH and counting on the US as its last great hope in long-haul service. I am more interested to see what SK does with the A321LRs at CPH over the longer term, as I doubt it does a whole lot for SAS as a whole out of ARN for very long.

Tango Alpha

SAS-version will have only 157 seats. That helps too.

ScandiGB

Are you arguing that their ability to do so is not driven by the population around that hub?

Are you arguing that SAS could do the same? If so would that be by focusing even more on CPH and having more of a 1-hub strategy?

I am not sure I understand your point.

GUWonder

I am saying that SAS has already failed in various ways with being a global player with long-haul service and that SK has been left with hunkering down in CPH and acting as if the US is its last great hope with regard to its long haul network.
.
Most of KLM’s long-haul network from
its home market hub is not heavily dependent upon (a) O&D traffic nor (b) upon the size of the airline’s home market residential population. The latter (b) at least used to be the case for SAS a long time ago, back when SAS had a more global presence than it does now; but SAS has since missed the boat and is left with hunkering down in CPH and having the US be its last great hope with regard to its long haul network. The chances of SAS now doing what KLM did and outlasting KLM? Not good for SAS, and so what I expect to see from SAS is a continued hunkering down in CPH and sticking to its comfort zone when it comes to the A321LRs too.

highupinthesky

Given how bad SK is in your view, I'm sometime wondering why you fly with them at all.

GUWonder

You have a very different view of how I view SK than is my view.

SAS is nothing great but it’s not so bad as to never be convenient for me. It’s also not so good that it deserves to be defended or praised for everything relevant to it and to do so regardless of the situation.

highupinthesky

Well. I can't read minds, so I have to base my interpretation of your view on SK based on what you post here, and I never see anything but complaint.

I don't view SK as state of the art either, but they are not so bad that I see the need for complaining about them every day.