AirAsia X To Mount Flights To Melbourne & Perth

SEPANG, April 5 (Bernama) -- AirAsia X will operate flights to Melbourne and Perth, with three more Airbus A330 aircraft coming in, as securing routes to Seoul and Sydney are a challenge. Currently, it is using six A330 and two A340 aircraft.

"For some reasons we are not privileged enough to get some routes. So, we will be adding more flights to Perth and Melbourne and keep pushing Mumbai and New Delhi routes in 2010," says chief executive officer Azran Osman Rani. AirAsia X will service the New Delhi route in August. "However, that doesn't mean AirAsia X is dropping those routes from its plan, we still want to fly to Seoul, Sydney, Jeddah and to one city in Japan as there is huge demand. So, the guys next door are not going to run away from competition as we will keep throwing in more flights in the current routes," he told reporters after unveiling the budget airline's premium "Lie-Flat Bed" seats at the Low Cost Carrier Terminal here on Monday.

As for Mumbai, Azran said AirAsia X has the rights to fly four times a week to the Indian city and was pursuing to secure another three more landing rights as only then the route would be economically viable. "We hope to secure the rights within this year. Singapore Airlines operates four flights to Mumbai daily, meaning Malaysia is losing out," he said. Asked on possible code-sharing arrangements with other budget airlines, Azran said it did not make sense to do code-sharing as with on-line booking, travellers could do it themselves.