| 01 Apr 2008 |
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| Corinne Wan |
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AIRASIA X, Malaysia’s long-haul budget carrier, is eyeing more routes with its latest order of another 10 Airbus A330-300 aircraft with a list value of US$2 billion.
The latest deal, sealed in Kuala Lumpur on March 27, brings the airline’s order for the aircraft to 25 units. In June last year it placed an order for 15 A330s. Two of the aircraft will be delivered this year and another two in 2009, with the rest progressively over the next five years.
AirAsia X’s chief executive officer Azran Osman-Rani said the latest purchase is in line with the airline’s aggressive expansion programmes.
Plans over the next five years are to fly to new medium-haul routes in Australia and China as well as to three cities each in South Korea, Japan and the Middle East,and four cities in India.
The services to Japan may start by end-2009 or early 2010 as the Japanese airports have shown great interest in the airline flying there.
As for the much-anticipated London route, Azran said AirAsia’s plan to fly to Stanstead this year would depend on the availability of aircraft. The airline has already received approvals from the authorities for the UK flight.
“We are looking at the possibility of getting long range aircraft such as Airbus A340 to enable us to go to UK,” he said,adding the carrier is open to the option of either buying or leasing at least two aircraft to service the route.
AirAsia X is also mulling the possibility of buying 25 new generation widebody planes, either the A350s orthe Boeing B787s, to serve its long-haul networks.
The carrier currently flies four times weekly to Australia’s Gold Coast, and five times weekly to Hangzhou in China using leased aircraft.
AirAsia X commenced flights in November last year and has, to date,carried about 120,000 passengers. |
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