PREMIUM
Wizz Air Abu Dhabi, the newest national airline of the United Arab Emirates, commenced operations this January despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, and has been growing its network on an almost weekly basis. Belgrade is the first city in the former Yugoslavia to be added to the airline's network with services due to commence on May 23. Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport reached out to Wizz Air Abu Dhabi to come to an agreement over the flights in order to fill the void left by Etihad Airways following the termination of its 3.827-kilometre service to Serbia last year. “We are always on the search for new routes and to seek the right airport parties who want to team up with us and understand that working with Wizz Air is the right thing to do”, Wizz Air Abu Dhabi Managing Director, Kees van Schaik, said.
Belgrade - Abu Dhabi - Belgrade passenger performance by year
Wizz Air Abu Dhabi will launch two weekly flights between Abu Dhabi and Belgrade. It faces no direct competition on the route with Etihad Airways discontinuing services between the two cities last October. Etihad Airways handled 114.256 passengers between Abu Dhabi and Belgrade in 2019 on 924 flights (both directions included). Its average annual cabin load factor stood at an extremely high 90.9%. However, the service relied heavily on transfer passengers, primarily to China and Australia. Its top five feeders for the Belgrade service in 2019 were Shanghai, Beijing, Sydney, Hong Kong and Melbourne. Both the Australian and Chinese markets remain closed for both inbound and outbound travel with Australia recently announcing it will keep its borders closed for international travellers until mid-2022. Air Serbia, Etihad’s equity partner, indicated earlier this year that the Emirati airline has not terminated its Belgrade service for good, but will return once circumstances permit.
Etihad Airways' top feeder routes to/from Belgrade in 2019
Wizz Air Abu Dhabi has reduced its planned operations to Belgrade to one per week for the first four weeks. However, it was given a boost this week when Serbia and the United Arab Emirates signed a quarantine free travel agreement for vaccinated passengers. The move comes as part of a joint UAE - Serbian cooperation and coordination agreement to press ahead with measures aimed at recovery from the fallout of Covid-19. The quarantine-free travel corridor will ease travel for vaccinated people holding vaccination certificates issued by health authorities in the two countries, as of May 15, without the need to apply health quarantine requirements upon arrival, while abiding by other precautionary measures, to ensure safe travel for all. While Serbian nationals were permitted entry into Dubai with a negative PCR test, entry into the Emirate of Abu Dhabi was not allowed, while Abu Dhabi residents returning from Serbia were required to quarantine for ten days and undertake multiple PCR tests, as well as wear an electronic movement monitoring bracelet. As per the new rule, citizens and expatriate residents, who want to benefit from the quarantine-free travel corridor, need to show evidence confirming they have received the last shot of the Covid-19 vaccine, according to the approved applications or certificates issued by their health authorities.
Despite Etihad primarily relying on transfer passengers between Belgrade and Abu Dhabi, there has been growing point-to-point demand between the two cities, due to strengthening economic ties between Serbia and the UAE, which has seen the latter invest significantly in a number of projects in Belgrade and further afield in the country. In 2019, there were 13.980 two-way origin and destination passengers between the Serbian and Emirati capitals, representing a 42% increase on the previous twelve months. Wizz Air Abu Dhabi will face indirect competition on the route from Flydubai, which maintains daily flights from Dubai, with the airline recently adding a second daily departure on select days throughout the first half of May due to strong demand.
Wizz Air Abu Dhabi has a fleet of four Airbus A321neos, which can fly nonstop to destinations of up to eight hours flight time. Wizz Air’s CEO, Jozsef Varadi, noted that opening air corridors to Eastern Europe, the Mediterranean and the Caucuses was a natural first step for its Gulf offshoot. “We are targeting leisure, but we are also aiming to get those people into the country who actually serve the leisure market. Let’s not forget, the proportion of Emiratis in the UAE is fairly limited. This country heavily relies on expatriates … and increasingly they are relying on the hospitality industry. We are much better placed for that traffic flow than anyone else because we know this is really a commodity and people don’t want to be overcharged. It’s a functional product”.