News
SIA Group to transfer SilkAir routes to Scoot, cancels Honolulu
November 23rd 2018
SIA Group low-cost long haul LCC, Scoot, will take over several of SilkAir’s routes in the next two years, ahead of SilkAir’s merger into Singapore Airlines (SIA). Read More » The changes are expected to take place between April 2019 and the second half of 2020.
They are the result of a detailed review that identifies airlines in the SIA Group portfolio that are best suited to meet evolving customer demand.
In the meantime, Scoot will suspend services to Honolulu from June 2019 “as a result of weak demand”. Scoot launched Singapore-Osaka-Honolulu in late 2017.
In April 2019, SilkAir flights to Luang Prabang and Vientiane will be transferred to Scoot. Services to Coimbatore, Trivandrum and Visakhapatnam will follow between May and October. Changsha, Fuzhou, Kunming and Wuhan will be added to the Scoot network between May and June next year.
In October 2019, Scoot will take over SilkAir’s flights to Chiang Mai, followed by Kota Kinabalu in December and Balikpapan, Lombok, Makassar, Manado, Semarang and Yogyakarta between May and July 2020.
In the interim, the SIA Group will transfer Scoot’s Bengaluru and Chennai routes to mainline SIA in May 2019 and May 2020, respectively. Both are existing SIA destinations.
SilkAir also will convert its Mandalay route to a seasonal schedule. Existing services will end in March 2019 and will resume from November 2019 to January 2020.
“We are now at the halfway mark in our three-year Transformation Programme and today’s announcement represents another significant development. The route review will strengthen the SIA Group for the long term, with the right vehicles in our portfolio of airlines deployed to the right markets,” said SIA CEO, Goh Choon Phong.
In May, SIA announced its regional full-service subsidiary, SilkAir, would have a significant investment programme to upgrade its cabin products ahead of its eventual merger into SIA. SilkAir’s cabins will fitted with lie-flat seats in business class and the installation of seat-back in-flight entertainment systems in both business and economy classes.
LCC Scoot’s fleet will be expanded with the transfer of 14 B737-800s from SilkAir, while SilkAir will expand its operations as it takes delivery of new B737 MAX 8 aircraft.
