[sparkyflier]

I was reading in a BA Highlife magazine that Feb 1st will be the 25th anniversary of the Oneworld alliance [edited by Business Traveller].

I think founding members were AA, Canadian Airlines, BA, Cathay and Qantas, but stand to be corrected.

Anyway it made me wonder if new members would be announced to mark the occasion, so thought to ask the forum who they think might join Oneworld, and indeed what airlines might join other alliances and could any switches happen?

Some thoughts to kick things off:-

Oneworld

Oman Air – offical entry date
Rwandair
China Southern
Philippine Airlines

Could LOT leave Star – not feeling much love there and the only factor keeping them is the Lufthansa FFP membership noose.

Skyteam

Latam
Etihad

Star Alliance

Already huge – but perhaps some leaves such as LOT or anyone else?

Looking forward to your thoughts, insight and any predictions.

[BackOfThePlane]

Um, I think we all know what you mean but, in your opening sentence, you refer to the “25th anniversary of the Skyteam alliance” as opposed to oneworld?

I think Rwandair would be a strong addition to oneworld in East Africa.

Perhaps, one day, somebody in West Africa will sort their stuff out and build an airline and hub airport to properly serve the region (and join one of the alliances).

Ghana would be the obvious choice but they keep messing it up.

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sparkyflier

[cybertravller]

I cannot see LOT leaving Star Alliance, they seem to be far too intertwined with LH for that to happen. I vaguely recall Malev Hungarian was OneWorld until it collapsed.

SAS is heading over to SkyTeam which is a huge defection, Rwandair would be a good addition for OneWorld in Sub-Saharan Africa as Star dominates with Ethiopian and SAA with SkyTeam having Kenya Airways.

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tomwjsimpson

[cwoodward]

OW have of course Royal Air Moroc in their fold – Moroccan RAM which is probably now the the second largest African operator after Ethiopian and has substantial expansion plans as well as fleet renewal and significant fleet expansion.

RAM have a fleet of 51 aircraft serving 90 mostly international destinations. In 2023,they announced a substantial expansion plan and of doubling the size of their fleet adding – international connections with new routes to several destinations in Asia are planned including I read Hong Kong and Beijing.
RAM are reported as being close to ordering several Airbus A321 and A350 aircraft. This would be a coup for Airbus as RAM has been a Boeing stronghold for many years

RwandAir is small in comparison with a fleet of only 14 aircraft at present which they work hard with both domestic and international services to East Africa, Central Africa, West Africa, Southern Africa, Europe, the Middle East and as far as Asia.
Being now 49% owned by Qatar (who also own 20% of Cathay) they look to be a shoe-in for OW membership giving the alliance a good spread across Africa and arguably better than the other alliances.

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cybertravller

[cybertravller]

Has anyone transited through Kigali? I ask as the logistics of transit to other African destinations would be a key factor for any Alliance membership.

[TominScotland]

Your point about RwandAir’s ownership, cwoodward, is a good one. As well as their stake in Cathay, Qatar also have a significant (25% is it?) holding in IAG.

RwandAir, of course, could well benefit from significant UK business traffic in the future – civil servants and lawyers?

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CrazyCanuck

[sparkyflier]

cwoodward – re RAM, if I was heading from UK/EU to Casablanca then would be happy to try them.

But to connect with them at at CMN on to their extensive West African network – no way.

Pretty much all their flights into those capital cities arrive between 1 and 4 am – which is not desirable from a safety and security point of view. And then the return flight even less desirable.

Furthermore the flights are operated by 737s – just not ideal on flights from 3-7 hours etc – with many needing to stop en-route.

These schedules and planes cannot compete with A, KL or SN A330s, 350s or 777s etc with lets say a short jump from LHR to CDG, BRU or AMS followed by a 6-8 hour flight in a nice wide-body.

IMO they did not bring much to the Oneworld offering. Having said that I would be pleased to try them on routes to and inside Morocco, and wish they did Marrakech to London to give some variety and more choice.

Re Rwandair I do think they will add and hope BA codeshare with them, especially as BA only operate into 4 Sub-Saharan nations now.

[cwoodward]

RAM do have I believe some ten 787 aircraft that they operate on their longer routes as well as the numerous 737s.

[MarcusGB]

One issue with “Partner agreements” that individual Airlines commence, is that they are in this Void with not being a full member of whichever Alliance it is.

Good examples of this are Etihad’s 10 yr Partnership with KLM/AF as one group, and their “Flying Blue” FF Program, but they are not part of Skyteam. Yet they have equal FFP reciprocal to members on both sides.

But done badly, Qantas started a promising desperately needed domestic Australia / Pacific coverage for KLM/AF, yet this is being watered down 1st April 2024.
This negates any possibility using yr Premium memberships on Qantas by Flying Blue members, as earning miles only, but nothing towards yr Membership. Luggage and priority check In will remain, but Lounge access is completely off the agenda!

As on many threads and contributions by Forum members, this seems to be a matter of concern and confusion.
Clarity of either Airlines Fully join as members of an Alliance, or declare simply Equal benefits for a reciprocal Partner agreement. Not these complicated bespoke “take this and leave that” aspects of a FFP, that are simply incorporated within any Alliance?

They should either join an Alliance, or have a full reciprocal Partnership agreement, without leaving out the key earned benefits for Travellers, or do not bother at all.
Financial gain for the Airlines is their obvious priority, and not of benefit for FF Members as sold to us, which simply is not true?!

[AndrewinHK]

A case can be made that CX does not belong in OneWorld nor does it particularly lean into partnerships with other One World partners. CX actively competes with BA/QF/JAL on long-haul routes to the UK/Australia and routes into Japan, yet it cooperates and revenue shares with Lufthansa and Swiss on long-haul routes into Germany and Switzerland. The biggest OW carrier American Airlines, currently does not serve Hong Kong, and of course neither do Iberia, RAM, RJ or UL.

[cwoodward]

I don’t altogether agree with Andrews comments although Cathay most certainly look after there own interests first as significant priority.

The rivalry with BA is historical as it was BA who via the UK parliament kept CX off of all UK routes for many years and it took a mammoth court case to have this ‘ban’ overturned. Now CX is having the last laugh having virtually driven BA off of the UK- HKG routes with prior covid 9 UK flights a day against BAs 1 or 2 daily on the route.

British controlled CXs routes and history are vary much intertwined with Australia and they have similarly driven QF of of the AU -HKG routes with normally 70 flights (61 at the moment) a week against maximum Qantas of about 18 they have also cornered the ‘down under market” Not totally divorced from this is then the substantial ‘out of alliance’ close cooperation and profit sharing arrangement with ANZ on the HKG-NZ route which also keeps Qantas off of the route that they would otherwise fly.

I suspect that American will be back to HKG sooner rather than later and of course with who Cathay do have an extensive code share arrangements.
Royal Jordanian RJ I understand is returning to Hong Kong in May 2024 It seems that they did intend to resume in 2023 and published the below

“Royal Jordanian Airlines in Northern summer 2023 season intends to resume service to Hong Kong, where the OneWorld member tentatively schedules 4 weekly Amman – Bangkok – Hong Kong routing, effective 28MAR23. Reservation for Hong Kong is available, but may see further adjustments in the next few months.

The other side of the coin is that CX has been active over the years in sponsoring new airlines to join OW and cooperates and actively code shares with some members. They were very active in having Fiji join as an associate member and a sponsor of RAM (who I understand intends to add a route to HKG or Cathay fly to the route and code share) –

CX numerous code share arrangements can be found here – https://www.cathaypacific.com/cx/en_HK/about-us/about-our-airline/alliance-and-partnerships.html

[EruditeSheep]

As a founding member, it is a great shame that SAS will shortly be leaving the Star Alliance to join Sky Team. But I guess it was inevitable, given the challenges of re-structuring and the extent of investment by Air France/KLM. So for those frequent flyers that wish to exploit their Star membership, journeys to Nordic countries will now always involve indirect flights. The “reach” of the Star Alliance into the UK is gradually being reduced – in 2012 it lost BMI, following a membership that ran from 2000. Then there were the challenges facing SAA and TG…..

[Maaki]

Unfortunately Star Alliance lost US Airways (in 2014/2015?), when they merged with American. So, only United is left for Star Alliance, which is a pity, if anyone wants to fly to smaller destinations in the US and arrives with SWISS, AUA, LH from Europe.

[EruditeSheep]

For those of you that may be interested, there is an interesting read from 1993 in the LA Times re USAir and BA, see:

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-03-16-mn-469-story.html

At one point, I believe that USAIr even repainted some of its 767s in BA livery, whilst still being responsible for their operation.

Maaki, there is also AC for westbound flights from LHR. OK these would involve indirect flights via a hub in Canada. But I don’t have a problem with UA – I have used them for many years, even for RTW flights when they flew via DEL and HKG.

[sparkyflier]

Oneworld celebrates 25th anniversary

Seems zero new members being announced on their 25th anniversary.

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