Starlux Airlines Co (星宇航空) aims to turn a profit next year by expanding its passenger operations to North American and Southeast Asian markets and by increasing its cargo business, CEO and general manager Glenn Chai (翟健華) told a news conference in Taipei yesterday.
The airline would offer new flights to Okinawa and Sapporo in Japan, as well as resume flights to Da Nang, Vietnam, at the end of next month to meet demand in the fourth quarter — a peak travel season, Chai said, adding that by that time, Starlux would be flying to a total of 13 destinations.
It would offer new flights between Taipei and Los Angeles from April and between Taipei and San Francisco in the second half of next year, he said.
Photo: CNA
It would also be using its wide-body aircraft on Asian routes, he said.
Soon after its launch in early 2020, Starlux’s operations were stalled by the COVID-19 pandemic and tight border controls worldwide.
With countries easing border controls, Starlux is upbeat about the outlook for global travel, especially with Taiwan also opening its borders soon, chairman Chang Kuo-wei (張國煒) said in a statement.
As of the end of June, global passenger demand had returned to about 70 percent of pre-pandemic levels, Chang said.
With the deliveries of new planes, Starlux’s fleet size would expand from 12 to 19, with 13 Airbus 321 Neo, four Airbus 330 Neo and two Airbus 350 jets, Chang said.
The airline aims to triple its capacity from a year earlier and double the number of flights in the fourth quarter from the third quarter, he said.
Addressing criticism that Taiwan’s market is too small to support a third airline — after China Airlines Ltd (中華航空) and EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空) — Chai said that Starlux would not solely rely on the domestic market, but also target transit, business and international passengers.
By leveraging Taiwan’s excellent location, the airline would develop its regional flying network in Asia and balance its operations in Northeast and Southeast Asia to sharpen its competitiveness, he said.
It would target about 1 billion transit passengers who transfer from North America to Southeast Asia, he said.
Ticket prices might be higher than they were in the past given inflation and anti-virus measures, but prices would primarily be determined by market demand and supply, Chai said.
The airline also plans to purchase cargo jets to boost its cargo business and would consider buying ATR aircraft for domestic operations, Chang said, while stressing that Starlux would focus on international flights.
“Domestic flights would come later, and they could cushion impact from unknown factors, such as a pandemic,” he said.
France cannot afford to ignore the third credit-rating reduction in less than a year, French Minister of Finance Roland Lescure said. “Three agencies have downgraded us and we can’t ignore this cloud,” he told Franceinfo on Saturday, speaking just hours after S&P lowered his country’s credit rating to “A+” from “AA-” in an unscheduled move. “Fundamentally, it’s an additional cloud to a weather forecast that was already pretty gray. It’s a call for lucidity and responsibility,” he said, adding that this is “a call to be serious.” The credit assessor’s move means France has lost its double-A rating at two of the
AI BOOST: Although Taiwan’s reliance on Chinese rare earth elements is limited, it could face indirect impacts from supply issues and price volatility, an economist said DBS Bank Ltd (星展銀行) has sharply raised its forecast for Taiwan’s economic growth this year to 5.6 percent, citing stronger-than-expected exports and investment linked to artificial intelligence (AI), as it said that the current momentum could peak soon. The acceleration of the global AI race has fueled a surge in Taiwan’s AI-related capital spending and exports of information and communications technology (ICT) products, which have been key drivers of growth this year. “We have revised our GDP forecast for Taiwan upward to 5.6 percent from 4 percent, an upgrade that mainly reflects stronger-than-expected AI-related exports and investment in the third
Mercuries Life Insurance Co (三商美邦人壽) shares surged to a seven-month high this week after local media reported that E.Sun Financial Holding Co (玉山金控) had outbid CTBC Financial Holding Co (中信金控) in the financially strained insurer’s ongoing sale process. Shares of the mid-sized life insurer climbed 5.8 percent this week to NT$6.72, extending a nearly 18 percent rally over the past month, as investors bet on the likelihood of an impending takeover. The final round of bidding closed on Thursday, marking a critical step in the 32-year-old insurer’s search for a buyer after years of struggling to meet capital adequacy requirements. Local media reports
RARE EARTHS: The call between the US Treasury Secretary and his Chinese counterpart came as Washington sought to rally G7 partners in response to China’s export controls China and the US on Saturday agreed to conduct another round of trade negotiations in the coming week, as the world’s two biggest economies seek to avoid another damaging tit-for-tat tariff battle. Beijing last week announced sweeping controls on the critical rare earths industry, prompting US President Donald Trump to threaten 100 percent tariffs on imports from China in retaliation. Trump had also threatened to cancel his expected meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in South Korea later this month on the sidelines of the APEC summit. In the latest indication of efforts to resolve their dispute, Chinese state media reported that
RSS