While Garuda and KLM went into a code share agreement, business towards Asia remained very favourable for the group Air France-KLM, despite the economic crisis.
AMSTERDAM- Garuda Indonesia and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines plan to collaborate more closely. KLM President and CEO Peter Hartman and Garuda’s President and CEO Emirsyah Satar recently signed two agreements to this end. The company leaders are enthusiastic about the idea of an intensified cooperation.
“By signing these pacts, we are taking a significant step in broadening the strong relationship that these two companies have long enjoyed,” Mr Hartman said. Mr Satar sees these partnership agreements as a logical next step in recent developments. “KLM and Garuda can do a great deal to help each other,” he said.
The closer collaboration refers to code-sharing for flights between Singapore and Denpasar. KLM and Garuda also plan to cooperate more intensively in the maintenance of aircraft components.
By code-sharing with Garuda, KLM can offer its customers daily connections between Singapore and Denpasar. In turn, Garuda’s passengers will gain access to greater frequency between these destinations. KLM now flies three times weekly from Amsterdam to Singapore and onward to Denpasar. From mid-January 2010 KLM’s frequency will increase to four flights a week. Garuda flies this route every day of the week.
The maintenance agreements will offer KLM the opportunity to contract out the maintenance of fan cowls to Garuda Maintenance Facilities AeroAsia, which services PT Garuda, the national airline.
Meanwhile, over the last year, Air France-KLM recorded strong performance on their Asian markets. For 2012 as a whole, traffic was up by 2.1% for just a 0.6% increase in capacity, leading to a 1.2 point improvement in the load factor to 83.1%.While Air France-KLM transport 77.45 million passengers, a figure up by 1.8% compared to 2011, Asian traffic recorded a growth of 2%, transporting to and from Asia 5.8 million of travellers. Load factor was extremely, progressing to 85.8%. Increased capacities to Asia might still be weak compared to the growth in demand for Asian flights.
But in 2013, many news will help expanding capacities. The Airbus A380 is already flying to both Tokyo Narita and Singapore. And for the sumer season, new destinations such as Fukuoka or Kuala Lumpur will help giving more exposure to the group Air France-KLM.
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.
