Low cost airline Wizz Air has based a second aircraft in Belgrade today and is to open four new routes, marking its first major expansion in the city following a public row with the airport in 2014. The jet arrived in the Serbian capital yesterday morning with flights to Friedrichshafen and Nuremberg launching today, while Hannover and Malta will follow over the weekend. The airline has scheduled a press conference in Belgrade at midday. All of its new routes will operate on a year-round basis, twice per week. Furthermore, it will boost frequencies on services to Dortmund, Eindhoven, Gothenburg, Memmingen and Stockholm Skavsta by adding an additional weekly flight. Wizz Air's CEO, Jozsef Varadi, said, “We are back in Belgrade after some turbulence. We are seeing significant demand for low cost flying in the country. We decided to deploy one more aircraft in Belgrade, our second Airbus A320 jet. It is a significant investment of around 100 million dollars. It will create 36 new jobs". He added, "This is the right stepping stone forward in this market which is unpenetrated. We are reacting to the increased level of demand".
Wizz Air's Belgrade expansion comes three years after it decided to significantly slash its operations from the city following a spat over fees. This resulted in the airline relocating one of the two aircraft it had stationed in Belgrade. At the time, the carrier said the city had become one of the most expensive in its network and accused "wannabe monopolists" Air Serbia and Etihad Airways of being behind the surge in fees. Commenting on the matter, Wizz Air's CEO said, “The airport charges are still high but the situation has changed. Over the last three years overall traffic has gone up 35%. Given the stronger than expected demand we decided that, despite the high airport charges, we would expand". The carrier noted that it would grow at a quicker pace if the fees were lower. "Should the charges come down we would do much more”, Mr Varadi added. This year, Wizz will offer 835.000 seats for sale to twenty destinations in seven countries from Belgrade and Niš.
The low cost carrier has now covered a number of destinations, particularly in Germany, which have been seeking services to Belgrade due to high demand. Other European airports which are also attempting to establish links with Serbia include Bordeaux in southern France, Brescia and Verona in northern Italy, as well as London Gatwick Airport. Furthermore, Madrid Airport has noted that 18.300 passengers travelled between the Spanish and Serbian capitals in 2015 (indirectly), while there were over 64.300 Internet searches for tickets between the two. In addition, Barcelona Airport, which has a seasonal link to Belgrade operated by Vueling, is seeking year-round flights to the city. In 2015, 14.719 passengers travelled with Vueling between the two cities, while a further 19.570 travellers flew indirectly between Belgrade and Barcelona. A total of 104.936 online ticket searches were made.
Wizz Air faces direct competition only on one of its four new routes from Belgrade, that being Malta. The budget airline will compete against Air Serbia, although the Serbian carrier maintains the service only on a seasonal summer basis, whereas Wizz will operate it throughout the year. Wizz Air has expanded its operation across the former Yugoslavia this year. In March it based a second aircraft in Tuzla and launched new destinations from the city, while it also commenced services from Budapest to Sarajevo, Pristina, Podgorica and Skopje. Furthermore, the airline will launch flights to Osijek today, while a new seasonal service from Katowice to Split will start in June. Later that month, the no frills airline will commence operations from London to Pristina, which will be followed by the stationing of its fourth aircraft in Skopje in July and the launch of three new routes as a result.
Comments
So is MMX five weekly now? I remember before the fight with the airport it was six. I wonder if by next summer we might see daily flights to Malmo.
Also, will be interesting to see if JU keeps its own Malta flights in winter since Wizz Air will.
Not if you believe the voices of experts on this forum. They will even go as far as to suggest that the numbers are incorrect.
Anyway good luck Wizz. Hope they add more destinations in the future.
I think it makes far more sense for someone like Norwegian or easyJet to launch LGW-BEG.
If JU keeps its Malta flights then they might face difficulties especially since JU won't be able to rely on transfer passengers like they do in Cyprus.
Also curious to see if they decide to base A321 to lower rates and compete with JU on busy routes.
Danas u Zagreb dolazi prvi ovogodišnji Korean Air let iz Seoula i to A330-200 (HL8211)
"Korean Air will resume its seasonal charters from Seoul on May 19 with its Airbus A330-200 aircraft. As was the case last year, a total of eleven flights will operate during the summer (May, June, September and October)."
http://www.exyuaviation.com/2017/05/zagreb-airport-targets-three-million.html
Good for spotters.
Italians top the list (5,180), followed by workers from Britain (3,985), Bulgaria (2,044), Hungary (1,308), Romania (1,262), Spain (1,119) and Sweden (1,085).
At 1,468, citizens of the Philippines top the third country nationals list, followed by Serbians (1,246).
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20161012/local/31500-foreign-workers-in-malta.627790
unemployed in Otazbina Serbi. Sorry Anon 9:20 AM. Letim srecno od kraja sesdesetih. Sada i kao penzioner, izmedju nove Domovine i mesta rodjenja, moje Otadzbine. Lako je Vama Anon 9:20. Vi mozete leteti i poslovnom klasom, jer verujem niste jadni gastarbeiter, niti iseljenik. Leteli bi vi i prvom klasom, ali neznam ko leti iz Beograda sa prvom klasom. Mozda vi to iz Nisa cinite. Sacekaj te Moravu ili Ponikve. Mozda ce te biti u prvoj klasi. Vi dte tipicno bogat covek. Bar na jeziku. Ipak prezivecemo mi po svetu. Makar i pristojno kada drukcije nemoze. Lou kosteri su za nas sirotinju van Otadzbine. Blago Vama, dragi nas Anon 9:20 AM. Uzivajte u dolazecem letu.
Pozdrav iz jesenjeg Sidneja. Rodney Marinkovic,
Kings Park
Sydney Australia
This proves the idiots saying there is no market to Madrid are totally wrong, direct flights would only stimulate demand. If JU was smart they'd launch it themselves.
It would be not strange if after all they will not start those flights. That is their standard practice. Don't know why, but that is fact.
- Tesla ima dovoljno kapaciteta
- Tesla ima mogućnost brzog, jeftinog i efikasnog povećanja kapaciteta na postojećoj infrastrukturi na 10 milijuna putnika
- i nakon toga Tesla ima prostora da se širi sa termialom D jednostavno i relativno jeftino
- dva aerodroma znače bitno više troškove operacija od kontrole letenja, preko zemaljskog transfera do Beograda, duplih aerodromskih službi, osiguranja, separacije...
- potencijalni konetirani putnici imali bi gubitak vremena trasfera od minimalno dodatnih sat vremena, te trošak istog (svaki puta kada sletim na CDG iz ZAG i idem na ORY lovit let za FDF dobim slom živaca, iako postoje dva dnevna leta za FDF i isto toliko za ZAG, barem u jednom smjeru moram noćiti u Parizu, to dodatno košta i uzima ozbiljno vremena)
- isto smanjuje prihod Tesle
- sa samo LCC i charterima Batajnica ne može biti profitabilna ni sa 2 milijuna putnika (što mislite zašto se Hahn zatvara?), te bi samo donosila gubitak
- konačno za prilagodbu Batajnice civionom zrakoplovstvu, te odvajanje vojnog dijela potrebna su bitna financijska sredstva, daleko veća nego što je povećanje kapaciteta na Tesli.
itd, itd, itd...
Ovakvo razmišljanje nema baš nikakve, ali nikave ekonomske opravdanosti.
Imagine Norwegian opening a base in BEG.
Bravo Hrvatska : Bravo Srbija
42:26
That would be so too expensive and one of most stupid move in the World.
That's where the money is for Wizz?
Vučić je rekao da je Vlada Srbije spremna da pomogne toj kompaniji
http://www.rts.rs/page/stories/sr/story/9/politika/2736147/vucic-sa-premijerom-kine-li-kecangom.html
DTM=DUS
HAJ=HAM
FKB=STR
FDH=ZRH/BSL
FMM/NUE=MUC
Shows how WIZZ is attacking Air Serbia with much lower costs.
Other than destination airport fees, where did you get the lower costs for W6 over JU? :)
That would mean flights to ATH which possible could delay flights to BEG because of relative proximity and overlapping of the two markets.
Just my 2 cents.
ATCO
They compete head-on on 2 routes from BEG - Larnaca and now Malta. They are also not always cheaper than JU to Laranca.
It wouldn't be too smart for them to take on JU to too many primary airports - they would not necessarily win that fight.
Even though JU was butchered in LCA I think they actually stand a chance in Malta.
That said, seems like JU and W6 have created a nice summer duopoly on BEG-LCA, both charge the same amount in July and August (31.600 RSD!)
Reality shows that W6 is cheaper than JU but at the same time is highly profitable.
In fact it has Europe's second highest profit margin after FR!
And all that without getting debts written off by government.
http://www.euro2day.gr/news/enterprises/article/1540165/psahnetai-gia-strathgikes-synergasies-h-aegean.html
As for leasing out their aircraft, they are looking to do so over the winter when demand drops off for them and every other airline. Other ex-yu airlines have announced similar plans to try to wet lease aircraft during the slower winter mths. So good move to cut costs and grow their LF's. Better to fly fuller and fewer aircraft than to fly more aircraft which are empty.
When there is competition it always lowers the price. But of course it will not mean that always the same airline has to "win". Ideally more than one airline serves the same destination otherwise again a monopoly can be created.
I have to say I didn't see that HNA group would make investments in European airlines. Good choice Aegean!
Both airlines could survive in Cyprus if JU could get some more connecting passengers. However, when it comes to Malta both airlines will have to compete for the rather limited O&D market. That's the main difference between the two markets.
In MLA JU has no other choice than to commit to the Maltese market so that it creates a loyal public that will fly with them no matter what. We will know more when they update their winter timetable and if MLA will be announced as a year-round destination.
If they decide to make it a seasonal one then I sincerely hope they won't bother returning next summer.
INN-NS
To što se bacio novac u Moravu i Ponikve, a da terminali nemaju ni jednog jedinog putnika, ne opravdava još jedan projekt koji ne bi imao logike, ekonomske opravdljivosti i koji bi stvorio jedan aerodrom sa bitno manje prihoda, a drugi koji bi bio gubitaš (Batajnica)
I understand it is upseting but try to eat a second sandwich and shut up.
You are embarasing yourself boy!
That said, I really don't know what feed they would have. Athens has a horrible geographical location to be a hub. It would have to rely on O&D passengers.