Thai Airways announced it will not extend its Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Tiger Airways, which is set to expire in October, therefore effectively terminating the pending alliance between the two carriers.
Thai Airways chairman, Ampon Kittiampon, said the carrier’s new regional airline Thai Smile would help replace Thai Tiger. “We will not extend our contract with the MOU, which will expire next month because we now have Thai Smile,” Ampon told Reuters.
The new subsidiary Thai Smile will fly domestic routes when it begins operations in July next year (see story here) before expanding to regional routes. However, in previous announcements it was made clear that Thai Smile is positioned as a “light premium” carrier offering inflight meals and two classes of travel, instead of a low-cost carrier, which is what Thai Tiger would have been if it had gone through.
Without Thai Tiger, Thai Airways will not have its foot in the lucrative low-cost carrier market, which is expected to grow exponentially in the coming years with the introduction of new carriers across the Asia-Pacific region (see story here).
For more information, visit www.thaiairways.com
Alisha Haridasani
