EVA Air Helps Boost Star’s Asian Presence

Star Alliance announced last week that its Chief Executive Board (CEB) had unanimously accepted the membership application of Taiwanese carrier EVA Air. This decision underscores the Alliance’s long term strategy of seeking network growth and providing access to new regions which show strong economic potential and development. Since its founding nearly 15 years ago, Star Alliance has progressively built its presence in the Asia/Pacific region and will have eight member carriers based in this region by mid-2013.

“EVA Air is a very good fit for Star Alliance as the airline will add many new routes to our global network, with a specific focus on the growing Far East aviation market. This will increase the choice for our customers and is in line with our mission of being the leading global airline alliance for the international traveler,” said Mark Schwab, Chief Executive Officer, Star Alliance.

EVA Air’s network of around 60 destinations will add Kaohsiung in Taiwan and Surabaya in Indonesia as unique airports to the Star Alliance network. In addition, Taiwan’s geographic location adds to the quality of the Star Alliance hubs in Asia, as it has the shortest average distance to all major cities in the Asia/Pacific region. In total, the network of 30 airlines (the current 26 and four future members) will offer more than 22,000 daily flights to 1,345 destinations in 191 countries.

For EVA Air, through its future membership in Star Alliance, it will be able to offer its customers access to a global network, along with seamless travel and status recognition within the various member carrier frequent flyer programmes. “After careful evaluation we concluded that Star Alliance offers the best match for EVA Air,” explained James Jeng, Chairman, EVA Air.

“Our networks complement each other and we will expand the existing Alliance flight options in the growing cross-straits market. We look forward to significant synergy in both service enhancement and expansion of our customer base. In addition, our partnership with Air China makes the Star Alliance especially attractive to us”, he added.

The integration process will now begin, with the respective teams at EVA Air and Star Alliance commencing the work on the various backroom functions and system developments that need to be completed before a new airline can join the Star Alliance network. EVA Air’s developing partner, Air China, will be assisting in this process as the mentor airline.

But what exactly will EVA Air bring to the global alliance? Well penetration in North Asia that will strengthen its position against its rival SkyTeam, which is currently the number one alliance in the region. Although Star counts Air China among its membership and Shenzhen as a future member (due for entry in the second half of this year), SkyTeam has secured Shanghai-based China Eastern Airlines and Shanghai Airlines, Guangzhou-based China Southern Airlines and Taiwan’s China Airlines as members, while Xiamen Airlines is completing preparation for its own entry to SkyTeam.

EVA Air is currently the second largest carrier in Taiwan with a 19.3 per cent share of the international capacity. When you include the operations of its subsidiary carrier UNI Air this increases to 21.4 per cent and provides it with a 43.4 per cent share of the domestic market too. UNI Air, which up until now has operated under its own brand, mainly serves the domestic market but has expanded into the Cross-Straits market as the relationship between Taiwan and Mainland China has thawed. The airline is in the process of adopting a corporate livery similar to that of EVA Air to strengthen ties and there is even a proposal to re-invent the carrier as a low-cost venture.

The table below highlights the ten largest international markets from Taiwan by estimated O&D traffic and the current operations of EVA Air (week April 14-20, 2012) on these routes.