All posts tagged: Silkair

SilkAir moving 17 services to Scoot ahead of merger

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SilkAir has announced that it will transfer 17 destinations to the low-cost subsidiary Scoot progressively, starting from April 2019.  In the same announcement, Scoot will be stopping its Honolulu service, barely a year after the inaugural service. It will also be giving up four other destinations that is currently served by SilkAir and Singapore Airlines. SilkAir to Scoot transfers The destinations SilkAir will be giving up to Scoot, along with the dates that will happen, are below: Country City Date Laos Luang Prabang, Vientiane April 2019 China Changsha, Fuzhou, Kunming, Wuhan May, June 2019 India Coimbatore, Trivandrum, Visakhapatnam May – October 2019 Thailand Chiang Mai October 2019 Malaysia Kota Kinabalu December 2019 Indonesia Balikpapan, Lombok, Makassar, Manado, Semarang, Yogyakarta May – July 2020 SilkAir has earlier this year transferred 6 other services – Hangzhou, Kalibo, Kuching, Langkawi, Palembang and Pekanbaru – to Scoot as well. Observers who are following the merger keenly will know that 14 of SilkAir’s current fleet of Boeing 737-800s will be transferred to Scoot progressively as well, while Singapore Airlines will …

SilkAir to upgrade cabins with flat bed business class seats, to be folded into SIA

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For the first time, SIA has gone public to address the elephant in the room: merging of the SilkAir into the Singapore Airlines brand. From 2020, the regional arm of Singapore Airlines will embark on an extensive cabin upgrade of the narrow body fleet, including lie-flat business class seats, seat back entertainment screen across all cabins to “ensure closer product and service consistency across the SIA Group’s full-service network”. The announcement also said that the SilkAir brand will only be merged into SIA after “a sufficient number of aircraft have been fitted with the new cabin product”. Finally it’s happening Many analysts have applauded the move and observed that this is ‘long overdue’, and that Singapore Airlines Group has come full circle to once again operate only two brands, down from four, which is a sensible move. While some people may be reluctant to give up the branding SilkAir has established over the last two decades, I do feel it’s no loss – it hasn’t quite caught up with times anyway. Most observers are watching how …

SilkAir to launch flights to its first Japanese destination – Hiroshima

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SilkAir has announced today that it will launch three times weekly non-stop flights to Hiroshima, Japan from 30 October 2017. This will be SilkAir’s first destination in Japan. The flight will depart at 1.45am on Mondays, Thursdays and Saturdays and arrive at 9.30am the same morning. Returning flights from Hiroshima will depart at 10.25am and land at Changi Airport at 3.40pm. The new route is significant on several fronts – it will be Hiroshima’s first non-stop link to Southeast Asia, as well as its furthest destination; and it will be the first Southeast Asian carrier to fly to Hiroshima. It is also set to become SilkAir’s furthest destination, edging out Cairns by a few minutes. Why SilkAir? Within the Singapore Airlines Group, it is very interesting that SilkAir was chosen to service this route. While it is technically SilkAir’s first scheduled services to Japan, it is not entirely new to the market, having previously ran seasonal charters to Okinawa and Hiroshima, with seats sold by travel agents. Previously, travellers to Hiroshima will have to transit at either …