Business | Aviation
Jazeera to induct more aircraft despite slowdown
At the time of diminishing global air travel, Jazeera Airways is increasing its fleet to 36 airplanes and destinations to 84 in the coming few years, according to a company official.
- By Nadia Saleem, Staff Reporter
- Published: 23:32 October 28, 2008
- Image Credit: Supplied picture
- Jazeera Airways plans to increase its fleet strength to 36 even though air travel is expected to fall globally.
Dubai: At the time of diminishing global air travel, Jazeera Airways is increasing its fleet to 36 airplanes and destinations to 84 in the coming few years, according to a company official.
Marwan Boodai, chairman and chief executive of Jazeera Airways told Gulf News that the airline would bring the total number of destinations to 84 within four years.
"Unlike other businesses, in the airline industry you know exactly where you are going to fly to and when. We have a solid business plan and a solid forecast for the future," Boodai said.
Boodai said at the reception of their seventh A320 aircraft in Dubai that they are looking to add another hub to facilitate an increased number of flights to many additional destinations in and around the Middle East.
"We are negotiating more than one option and hopefully in the first quarter of 2009, we will be announcing our third hub," Boodai said. When asked for the location of the this hub, he said that it "has to be in the Middle East. It will be more toward the North than to the South."
The airline plans additional flights from its two hubs in Kuwait and Dubai to new cities in Iran, Pakistan, India, Saudi Arabia and the Levant countries, as well as Turkey.
The third hub is still on the drawing plan, he said. "Not everybody thinks like Dubai who are way ahead of the rest of the Middle East."
Barathan Pasupathi, vice-president of finance and administration, told Gulf News that Jazeera Airways invested close to $110 million (Dh404 million) on the recently launched hub of Dubai in its initial year.
The expenditure for the deployment of two to three planes will jump almost tenfold when the airline increases the number of planes out of the hub in Dubai to almost 15.
As 25 per cent of the expected 40 aircraft will be deployed in Dubai, the airline "will be investing about $1 billion annually", Pasupathi said referring to direct and indirect operational costs.
Fuelled by expected demand for air travel within the Middle East, the Kuwait-based company plans to become the largest A320 operator by 2014.
The last of these planes is set to be delivered by 2014 if not earlier, as the company is "looking at every opportunity to accelerate orders", Pasupathi said.
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