News
Air China and Air Canada sign trans-Pacific joint venture
June 15th 2018
Air China and Air Canada have signed a trans-Pacific joint venture (JV). Read More » The JV, expected to be phased in over the next six months, will allow Star Alliance members to expand their existing codeshare relationship and increase commercial cooperation on flights between Canada and China and on key connecting domestic flights in both countries.
“The Sino-Canada market is one of the important long-haul markets to Air China, which has been developed rapidly in recent years with an increase of 17.8% in 2017. Air China and Air Canada have the foundation of a profound cooperation and under a JV framework will offer a wider range of products and quality services, and provide more flexible flight choices, favourable fare products and seamless travel experiences for customers,” Air China chairman, Cai Jianjiang.
“Our joint venture agreement with Air China is an important strategy in our global expansion as it significantly increases Air Canada's presence in an aviation market set to become the world's largest by 2022. Having served China for more than 30 years, and as demonstrated by Air Canada's average annual capacity growth of 12.5% over five years and the $2 billion of aircraft assets currently committed on routes between Canada and China, China is an integral part of our global network,” said Air Canada president and CEO, Calin Rovinescu.
Air China has a JV with Lufthansa on flights to Europe. The Mainland carrier expanded its “strategic partnership” with United Airlines on services to the U.S. in 2016 but no fully-fledged trans-Pacific JV with United has been raised in public discussions.
Air China and Air Canada increased codeshare flights between the carriers to 564 a day in May. Last December, the two airlines began an expanded reciprocal lounge agreement for customers and introduced the carriers’ first joint frequent flyer promotion for their respective PhoenixMiles and Aeroplan members.
In the last two years, Air China has launched flights directly linking Beijing with Montreal and Air Canada has commenced non-stop flights between Montreal and Shanghai. The two carriers will now operate up to 52 trans-Pacific flights a week between Canada and the Mainland.
