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Gulf Air launching Rome, Entebbe and Juba

Originally published on www.businesstravellerme.com 24/08/2011 - Filed under: News »

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Gulf Air is launching Rome, Entebbe and Juba flights this winter and embarking on wholescale service and hardware changes as it places more emphasis on revenue generation after cost cuts.

Four-a-week Bahrain-Rome services will begin November 30 on A320s, joining a wide range of other Gulf carriers operating the route.

Entebbe flights, similarly four-a-week on A320s from December 5, promise to be no less competitive with Emirates already operating services to the Ugandan city and Qatar Airways starting services on November 2.

With the launch of three-a-week Juba services, however, Gulf Air will be stealing a march on its nearest rivals, as it aims to capitalise on economic opportunities in the newly independent South Sudan.

Inaugural promotional fares to Rome, Entebbe and Sudan will start from AED567, AED910 and AED1150 respectively from Dubai.

The trio of new routes appear at odds with the airline's current focus to concentrate on growing GCC and Middle East routes.

But CEO Samer Majali said they dovetail with the airline's long-term strategy "to connect Bahrain and the region with new and unexplored markets."

Speaking in Dubai, Karim Makhlouf, Chief Commercial Officer, said: "Gulf Air has been focused on reducing costs and what was missing was a strong drive on the revenue side. It's a pity the airline has lost terrain (to Gulf carriers) but now it's fighting back with concrete action plans."

The gloves are certainly off on the Bahrain-Dubai route this winter, with the airline upping its schedule to nine flights a day. Maklouf aims to grow its 40% market share on this service by an additional 20%.

Coinciding with the push on Dubai, Gulf Air's lounge will reopen as a double-storey facility at Dubai International in November.

Major in-flight communication changes are also looming soon, with the introduction of the Panasonic Global Communications Suite (Click here). Charges for unrestricted access to eXTV are likely to be around €20 per flight.

In other developments:

• lie-flat business class seats will be installed across its A320LRs and A330s

• Its FFP, Falconflyer, will be relaunched in September, making it easier for corporates to avail of redemptions

• More than 1,000 SMEs have been approached to sign up to its newly launched Falcon Corporate Plus programme

• The airline continues to have talks about joining one of the major alliances "soon"

• Plans to increase services to Saudi Arabia wil be announced in September

• A new booking engine will be introduced on the airline's website by the end of the year

For more information, visit gulfair.com

Report by Dominic Ellis

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COMMENTS » 

sleak76 - 25/08/2011 20:13

Re. Gulf Air launching Rome. Would be great if Dominic Ellis would research before publishing his article.

He states: "Four-a-week Bahrain-Rome services will begin November 30 on A320s - making it the fourth Gulf carrier, alongside Emirates, Etihad and Qatar, to ply the route".

Incorrect. A quick Net search would yield the following correct info:

Saudi Airlines flies non-stop to FCO from both JED and RUH. 2x weekly from JED and 3x weekly from RUH.

Kuwait Airways: 4x weekly KWI-FCO.

Hence, Gulf Air becomes the 6th and one of the final Gulf carriers to fly into FCO (along with Oman Air, who have yet to initiate service MCT-FCO).

I hope BT can rectify this info for all readers.

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