Abu Dhabi: Singapore Airlines plans to deploy its Airbus A380 aircraft on the Singapore-Zurich route and daily flights will start in two weeks' time, Richard Lee, Singapore Airlines General Manager-Gulf, told Gulf News yesterday on the sidelines of a news conference here.

Lee said Singapore Airlines currently has 10 Airbus A380s in its fleet, which fly to Sydney, London, Melbourne, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Paris daily from Singapore. London flights are twice daily. The airline was the first to start Airbus A380 flights in the world.

Asked if Singapore Airlines has plans to deploy its Airbus A380 on the Singapore-Dubai route, Lee said: "We have no such plans, as of now." He also said in the foreseeable future Singapore Airlines has no plans to deploy its Airbus A380 aircraft on any of the routes that the airline serves in the Middle East.

Singapore Airlines will introduce daily Airbus A330-300 aircraft from Abu Dhabi to Singapore starting March 29, featuring the airline's latest product and service offerings, the company announced at the news conference. "From March 28/29, the airline will also commence A330-300 services from Singapore to Jeddah and Kuwait (both via Abu Dhabi) as well as to Male. From April 28, A330-300s will be deployed to Fukuoka and Taipei, and from May 1 the aircraft will serve Colombo.

The services will replace the airline's Boeing 777 operations on these routes," Singapore Airlines said.

"The introduction of this new aircraft on this route provides us the opportunity to enhance our product offerings for customers from the region. This also reaffirms our commitment to constant innovation to offer the finest products and services to our customers," said Lee.

The Singapore Airlines A330-300 is configured in a two-class layout with 30 business class and 255 economy class seats.

Lee said although the number of flights on the Abu Dhabi-Singapore route remains the same, there would be an overall capacity reduction of about 6 per cent with the introduction of the new aircraft.

Lee said the Middle East market for airline companies is "improving nicely and will grow in the coming months".