A loan of up to €150m from the German government has been approved by the European Commission, ensuring Air Berlin will continue to operate over the coming months.
As foreign competitors continue to erode flag carrier El Al’s market share, Routesonline looks at the growing appeal of Israel for international airlines.
Routesonline's latest analysis of the European aviation industry, examining the top routes, airlines, airports and aircraft that are leading the market.
Low cost airline Ryanair has warned that it could be forced to cancel flights and move aircraft out of the UK unless a new aviation deal with the European Union is struck.
For a long time Ryanair has served the greater Frankfurt market via its operations from Hahn Airport, a secondary facility around about 120 km (75 mi) from the city. However, as part of its business maturity and to boost premium traffic the carrier is now serving more major airports and its arrival into Frankfurt is a major part of this network project.
This latest growth from Ryanair for winter 2017/2018 and further connectivity gains will boost international capacity from Israel beyond ten million seats for the first time. This is a significant landmark as the five million figure was only surpassed less than ten years ago in 2008.
Not content with a 40+ per cent growth in passenger traffic in 2016, one week into the New Year Cornwall Airport Newquay has already confirmed the launch of a new summer link to the Republic of Ireland from Stobart Air and the return of Flybe services to London Stansted as part of an expanded summer 2017 programme that will also see increased frequencies on five existing domestic routes.
The budget airline has already established itself as the largest carrier in Italy and held a 22.8 per cent share of available capacity this past summer season, according to OAG schedule data. The airline’s arrival into the Naples market means that from the forthcoming summer season it will have a presence at all but one of the 14 largest Italian airports by capacity; its only exception being Linate Airport, the secondary international airport of Milan.
The European Commission has found that public funding granted by Austria to Klagenfurt airport is in line with European Union (EU) state aid rules, but as ruled that certain airport services and marketing agreements concluded between the airport operator and airlines Ryanair, Hapag-Lloyd Express and TUIfly gave the latter “an undue advantage”, which cannot be justified under state aid rules.
Air Berlin’s loss is the Irish carrier’s gain as their expansion in Germany reaches the business hub of Frankfurt. This follows Ryanair opening a base at Hamburg, stationing two aircraft at the airport.
Located between Germany's two hub airports of Frankfurt and Munich means Airport Nurnberg may be the small fish in the pond, but it hopes Its Blue Ocean campaign will help deliver new capital city connectivity in the future.
Newcastle Airport officials are celebrating their growing relationship with Irish low-fare carrier Ryanair with the addition of a new link to the Spanish capital, Madrid in summer 2017. The airline had already revealed an expanded 2017 programme earlier this summer when it added flights to Faro, Girona and Palma to its Newcastle network.
Ryanair's introduction of flights from Oslo Airport to London Stansted and Vilnius follows the confirmation this week of the closure of the airline’s base at Rygge after the Norwegian Government introduced of an 80NOK tax on all departing passengers. Ryanair said the “environmentally unfriendly tax” will damage Norwegian tourism, traffic and jobs and left it with “no choice” but to modify its Oslo operations.
The expanded offering will boost its available capacity by 19 percent to 450,000 annual seats and will include a new twice weekly link to the recent Routes Europe host city, Kraków, in Poland. It will also extend summer routes to Faro, Gran Canaria and Malta into the winter schedule, adding to its current flights to Alicante, Malaga and Tenerife.
Maximising Dublin’s connectivity potential is the focus for Ireland’s two largest carriers. Speaking at the Phocuswright Europe conference in the Irish capital this week, Ryanair’s chief marketing officer, Kenny Jacobs, has hinted that flight connections with Aer Lingus could be a reality within the next 12 months.
It seems there’s more than enough room in Budapest for Europe's rival low-cost carriers Ryanair and Wizz Air. Wizz Air CEO József Váradi and Ryanair CMO Kenny Jacobs share their plans to Routes News magazine.
Valencia, the third largest city in Spain after Madrid and Barcelona, believes it is an ideal year-round destination for the world’s airlines and regularly takes a presence at leading aviation and tourism events such as Routes Europe to highlight what it has to offer. And it appears that a story of over 300 days of sunshine a year is being understood by the world’s airlines.
