While a growing number of airlines are signing up to airline alliances, Etihad is intent on flying solo.
The Middle East carrier has no plans to join any of the airline alliances, its chief commercial officer Peter Baumgartner told TMCs.
Speaking at the Guild of Travel Management Companies’ (GTMC) annual overseas conference at Fairmont Bab Al Bahr in Abu Dhabi, he said partnerships with other airlines were enough to drive growth.
“Etihad now has around 30 bilateral partnerships with other airlines, that has helped us feed our flows from secondary markets in the USA, Australia and emerging European markets,” he said.
“This gives us reach beyond our network and means we are able to compete without requiring membership of one of the three major alliances.”
For example, in February the airline cemented its partnership with Virgin Australia – which recently rebranded from Virgin Blue – allowing the two airlines to codeshare on a combined 27 flights per week between Sydney and Abu Dhabi.
The partnership stretches to joint scheduling and pricing, staff exchange and shared ground handling, with members of the airlines’ frequent flyer programmes able to collect and spend points on both airlines.
“Partnerships have also helped us to achieve combined scale in smaller markets, sharing traffic to challenge the dominant players,” added Baumgartner.
The airline sees its core strength as its Abu Dhabi hub – which has one billion people within two to three hours flying time, said Baumgartner – and plans to continue growth from the emirate.
Etihad will nearly triple the number of aircraft and double the number of routes from Abu Dhabi within the next nine years. By 2020 the airline plans on having 150 aircraft flying to some 120 destinations – it currently has 57 aircraft flying to 67 destinations.
The key to these expansion plans is in Abu Dhabi as a world hub serving a wide number of destinations, said Baumgartner.
He said the diversity of markets served by the airline had lessened the impact of the recent civil unrest in the airline’s home region, but conceded that Etihad had suffered.
“Instability in the region has of course had its impact,” said Baumgartner. “No airline, indeed no business that operates in this region has been spared disruption.”
But long term growth is a given, he said: “We are seeing more travellers eschewing the south-east Asian megahubs as Gulf airlines divert those traffic streams and challenge the world traffic order. We are seeing a very sustainable growing of the pie.”
Those Gulf airlines also represent a risk to the airline, however, as Baumgartner admitted: “The competitive outlook is tough.
“The Gulf is home to three growing international airlines, of which Etihad today is the smallest. Dubai, Qatar and Abu Dhabi have placed tourism aviation at the heart of their overall strategy.”