As competition remains intense on Indonesia’s domestic lines, national flag carrier Garuda Indonesia wants to strengthen its market shares by upgrading its fleet and expanding its regional hubs.
JAKARTA- National flag carrier Garuda Indonesia is ready to invest up to IDR 37.5 trillion (US$ 3.9 billion) between 2012 and 2015 to acquire new aircraft and expand its various domestic hubs in Indonesia in a bid to compete more efficiently with domestic budget carriers such as Lion Air, Mandala or Batavia.
The sum would be allocated to further densify the number of flights from its current hubs in Jakarta, Denpasar and Makassar, to open two new hubs in Medan and Balikpapan (Indonesian Borneo) as well as putting new aircraft in service.
Talking to Indonesian media, Garuda President Director Emirsyah Satar said the five hubs were expected to better connect regions within Indonesia’s six economic corridors, namely Java, Sumatra, Bali-Nusa Tenggara, Sulawesi and Papua-Maluku. Jakarta and Denpasar will also continue to be international gateways for Garuda with a wide range of connections to domestic destinations. “With the hubs, we expect to be able to serve around 1,000 flights per day from [the current] 390 flights per day,” Emirsyah explained last week. Garuda’s growth will however need to be supported by capacity’s growth in airport’s infrastructure. Most Indonesian airports are severely constraint by the lack of investments in recent years. According to an Australian study done for Indonesia’s Ministry of Transport, all large airports in Indonesia –Manado excepted- suffer from heavy congestion.
Garuda remains however upbeat about its future. The airline expects to transport 45 million passengers on both Garuda and its budget affiliate Citilink by 2015 compared to over 20 million passengers expected this year. The airline targets to operate 194 aircraft by 2015 compared to 94 planes today. For the first seven months of 2012, the Indonesian carrier transported 10.02 million passengers compared with 8.64 million a year earlier. The company’s January to July operating profit surged to $40.8 million from $1.9 million a year earlier, Garuda said in a recent e-mailed statement.
Luc Citrinot a French national is a freelance journalist and consultant in tourism and air transport with over 20 years experience. Based in Paris and Bangkok, he works for various travel and air transport trade publications in Europe and Asia.
![[PR] PR_Ascott and Vimut Hospital_2024](https://www.traveldailynews.asia/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/PR-PR_Ascott-and-Vimut-Hospital_2024-400x265.jpg)
