Air France and Delta have begun their Joint Venture (JV) in which they share their code, costs and profits on daily direct transatlantic services from London Heathrow to Los Angeles, Atlanta and New York JFK.
While other US carriers have also started Heathrow services following the start of Open Skies yesterday (30 March), Air France is the first European carrier offering long-haul to the US from London. By 2010, the two airlines say their JV will be extended to all transatlantic flights.
”This is the first time Air France will operate a long-haul flight from a country outside France to the US ” this is just the first one, but maybe there will be others,” said Air France-KLM deputy CEO Pierre-Henri Gourgeon. ”Everyone knows the London market is one of the most buoyant in the world ” the premium traffic to and from London is three times the size of that to Paris and the potential market between London and Los Angeles is as large as that between Paris and New York. I am very confident in the success of this.”
Delta executive vice president Glen Hauenstein said: ”This is the first phase of a deeper form of co-operation between the two airlines, and we think this is one of the single most important things in Delta”s future.
”What”s been missing from our portfolio is the Heathrow access - this has been a big deficit for our international service product, not being able to serve the largest market of Europe”s airports.”
Hauenstein said Heathrow”s Terminal 5 problems would not put passengers off using the airport just as the new US carriers arrived, and added that there was room for the competitors to be successful.
”I think every new terminal and airport when it opens has a little indigestion and that”s this week”s news, but long-term Heathrow has continually been preferred by the customers year-in year-out, decade-in decade-out, and I”m sure the issues at T5 will be resolved and Heathrow”s reputation as a global gateway will not be damaged.
”It”s a fallacy that all of these markets are mature. Whenever you put more service in, I can”t really tell you why but more people tend to travel. Our intent is to give customers what they really want, which is more non-stop services, attractive fares and routing that they want. In a market as big as, say London to LA, yes it will grow because of additional services ” whether it will be 7% or 10%, I can”t tell you, but it will be substantial. A lot of that traffic will come off non-stop services.”
He added that it would be uncomfortable for the incumbent airlines flying Heathrow-US services this year, ”because it is the richest in the transatlantic and certainly the increased competition will put downward pressure on fares ” if you”re the non-incumbent that”s great. If you”re the incumbents, it”s not so exciting.”
Despite US recession fears and the state of the dollar, Hauenstein said corporate travel ” despite weakening within the States ” remains strong internationally because American corporations ”are realising that they cannot stay within the US borders in order to make the returns that they want.”
Gourgeon added that Phase II Open Skies talks would start in May ” ”I don”t know what the future of those will be [but] I don”t see a return to the former situation to be easily accepted by customers.”