WestJet to purchase Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners
 

Aircraft provides Asian, South American and further European capabilities

full release

CALGARY, May 2, 2017 /CNW/ - WestJet announced today a definitive purchase agreement with The Boeing Company for up to 20 Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner aircraft. This agreement includes commitments for 10 Boeing 787-9 aircraft to be delivered between the first quarter of 2019 and December 2021, with options for an additional 10 aircraft to be delivered between 2020 and 2024. The airline also announced it has selected General Electric's GEnx-1B engine for the 787.

"This order represents an exciting new chapter in WestJet's history," said Gregg Saretsky, WestJet President and CEO. "We have carefully executed on our strategic plan, first launching WestJet Encore to connect smaller communities across Canada to our growing network followed by our successful venture into wide-body flying to Hawaii and London Gatwick. Now, with the most sophisticated commercial airliner available, we turn our attention to further growing our international presence and introducing even more travellers to our award-winning guest experience."

The Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner is a state-of-the-art aircraft that is 20 per cent more fuel efficient than the Boeing 767 aircraft. With a range of more than 14,000 kilometres, the Dreamliner will give WestJet the ability to serve new destinations in Asia and South America, and to expand its service offerings into the European market.

"We welcome WestJet to the Dreamliner family and look forward to the new destinations they will serve," said Ray Conner, Vice Chairman of The Boeing Company. "WestJet, for its entire 21-year history, has been a loyal all-Boeing jet customer and we're excited to see them expand their fleet with the 787."

"Our ability to compete globally and deliver our plan comes from the hard work and dedication of our more than 12,000 WestJetters and I am excited for what this news represents for them," continued Gregg Saretsky. "They are truly representative of our Canadian values of warm hospitality and openness and on behalf of them, we now turn our attention to welcoming the Dreamliner to the WestJet family."

As part of this purchase agreement, WestJet is converting 15 firm orders for the Boeing 737 MAX that were to be delivered between 2019 and 2021 to options available between 2022 and 2024.

I'm excited about this.... Wonder what the business class offering will look like!!

My guess is it will be a mirror of this:

https://cdn.seatguru.com/en_US/img/1...eing_787-9.jpg

source

This just made my day :-)

Please join skyteam

Yes!! Tokyo.

I think they need a tier above Gold, so that when they join an alliance or start this long routes, we get top tier. Or, they need to stop status matching. Either will do.

[T]hat's a bold move. The 767 routes must have been doing very well.

+1

Great news! The architect of the route planning has some deep industry roots:

http://blog.wandr.me/2017/05/westjet...campaign=20522

The man driving the decisions on which airports will be served is no stranger to such growth. Brian Znotis serves as the airline’s VP for Network, Alliances & Corporate Development and has a 20+ year history in airline network planning. Znotis moved back to Canada in late 2016 after 17 years with Continental Airlines and United Airlines, eventually rising to VP Network at the Chicago-based carrier. He was the driving force behind much of the long-haul expansion for United and now appears set to bring a similar plan at WestJet.

So now, there's a couple questions...

To me, they can take this either way...they can either become part of an alliance a legacy type carrier with true business class, multiple long haul destinations etc.

However, based on the announcement of their ULCC division or whatever u wanna call it, I'd suggest they're going the other way. They're gonna try to be Scoot or Nok Air, whatever. They'll cram this thing with as many seats as possible, the "J" will be basically what it is on the garbage 767s now. The long haul routes will be mainly the touristy ones...LGW, ORY, FCO/VCE, and the like.

I'm not sure the barriers to entry to joining some of these alliances, but I know most of the time they want to have some synchronicity across the different airlines. How much of a drop down does a CX J passenger see when they arrive in Vancouver and then jump on an aircraft to YUL? I certainly wouldn't wanna be a customer of a full service airline then connecting on to an LCC.

The 767s were a joke to begin with, but my guess is they wanted to jump right into the long haul and couldn't get the 787s fast enough and didn't wanna go with any kind of airbus either.

As someone who's worked closely with WS for years, I just don't see this as some game changer for them. I don't see this as a huge transformation. Sure the 787 opens new possibilities, but they could've flown to Japan from Vancouver with the 767 and haven't. Where are they gonna fly in South America? YVR-GRU? Doubtful. YVR-LIM? Doesn't make much sense. So to me it's only Asia and Europe, I think Asia is already fairly well served, think what you might of these mainland Chinese carriers or HK Airways, but they've beaten WS to the punch as being the secondary carriers to the legacy guys.

What I DO see this as...is a huge shot at Air Transat. WS can and will compete with them on these european routes. Currently WS can only compete with them on the LGW route, but now fuhgettaboutit. They can take all their feed traffic and send them overseas on these birds which while they may be a bit uncomfortable and with less service, will still be a better option than transat. They'll fly daily to multiple spots, 3x weekly to others, meanwhile TS doesn't offer that and doesn't offer the connecting service. Wanna fly to CDG from YVR? Hope you like flying on a Tuesday (for example). Now I know TS has that built in package advantage that some people like...but I think the advantages WS has will trump that.

Your move Transat.

Agreed. I see this moving more to the Norwegian model than the Full Service Airline model (which is why I posted the Norwegian 789 seat map above).

Transat isn't in a great position tbh. Air Canada Rouge on one side, Sunwing another, and now WestJet going after their heavy lifting. Who is the most capitalized of the bunch?

Yes! Let wait and see. I am pretty sure they will considering join Skyteam. It will happens.

I'd rejoice if it wasn't for the myriads of 787s that already contaminate StarAlliance and OneWorld :( .

Wonder what routes the Norwegian model would be successful in? Probably YYZ-LGW, (LAX-)YVR-HKG, (LAX-)YVR-NRT though those markets are pretty saturated already, but then can probably fly some extra utilization hours between YYZ and YVR.

I would look at Rouge and Transat as guidance there. Europe in the Summer, Sun in the Winter. Lots of 1-3 frequencies a week plus some concentration in LGW like now.

Add in something like Hong Kong 3 times a week all year round from YYZ and YVR.