Baltic national carrier Estonian Air has outlined its revised business strategy as it attempts to develop its presence in the Baltic markets and fight off competition from local rivals and growing low-cost traffic into the country’s capital Tallinn. The airline plans to develop a hub-and-spoke system and will increase its network to support O&D and connecting traffic between Russia and the CIS and destinations across Western Europe.

“The network model enables to widen travelling opportunities for Estonian people and improve Estonia’s attractiveness by promoting incoming tourism and developing international economic relations,” said Joakim Helenius, Chairman of the Supervisory Board, Estonian Air. “Recent trends in the aviation market give us a unique opportunity to enlarge the Tallinn Airport into a regional hub, which can be served by Estonian Air and lets also other operators bring more passengers. In order to ensure sustainable development and growth we need to increase the amount of passengers flying through Tallinn.”

The first stage of Estonian Air’s transition to a network carrier has already commenced. It has boosted frequencies on six of its year-round routes to increase options for passengers, opened a new route from Tallinn to Trondheim and resumed flights between Tallinn and Vilnius and revealed plans to add a direct service to Jyväskylä from the Estonian capital next spring.

The Estonian market is witnessing strong growth during the first half of this year with the airline claiming that passenger traffic has increased by 37 per cent during the period, one of the largest rises across the whole continent.