KLM is to start a business class only service between Amsterdam and Houston from next month.
The service will operate six times a week in a 44-seat Boeing Business Jet (BBJ) leased from the Swiss private air charter company PrivatAir.
The new service, which will start on October 30, is aimed at the oil industry, in particular Shell executives, hundreds of whom fly regularly on the Amsterdam-Houston route.
KLM is the third European carrier to start a transatlantic business-class only service. Lufthansa operates from Dusseldorf to Newark and Chicago and from Munich to Newark while Swiss started a Zurich-Newark service earlier this year.
PrivatAir leases the aircraft for all these routes and says that other carriers are set to follow with
their own business class only services.
The new KLM service which will be a codeshare with its long time partner Northwest Airlines,
will replace the carrier's existing three time a week Boeing 767 service but supplement its daily 747-400 service between the two cities.
This will increase KLM's flights to Houston from ten to 13 a week and raise the capacity by 45%.
The BBJ will be equipped with winglets and a larger fuel tank while its interior will be adapted to KLM's World Business Class standards which includes plug in points for laptops.
KLM said its flights from Houston connected with services to and from oil-producing regions including the Middle East, Africa, Russia, countries around the Black Sea, Norway and the UK.