TravTalk India Online Magazine
Owing to increase in demand, SriLankan Airlines is all set to increase its frequencies to Delhi, Mumbai, and Hyderabad, shares Dimuthu Tennakoon, Head-Worldwide Sales & Distribution, SriLankan Airlines.
TT BUREAU
With the recent launch of services to three new destinations, SriLankan Airlines is expanding its reach in India making itself the biggest foreign airline from the country. Dimuthu Tennakoon, says, “India has been a vital route in our network from the early days. Along the years, SriLankan Airlines has established a strong market presence and lasting relationship with the travel partners and industry stakeholders in India. SriLankan Airlines hold the widest coverage in India, and India is Sri Lanka’s number one source of inbound tourist traffic. Today, we directly operate to 14 Indian destinations with a total of 126 flights a week. The three new destinations introduced in 2017, Visakhapatnam, Hyderabad and Coimbatore commenced operations with four frequencies a week and made us the foreign carrier that operates out of the most number of cities in India. However, due to the passenger demand and favourable business associations, the Hyderabad frequency will be increased up to five flights per week from November 2017. India is a strong contributor to our network revenue with a current contribution of about 15-20 per cent. Hence, our Indian routes are operated with both A330 and A320 aircraft in accordance with the passenger demand and favourable operating conditions.”
Apart from increasing frequencies to Hyderabad, the airline is also going to expand its network in Delhi and Mumbai. “SriLankan Airlines Commercial Planning is constantly studying the dynamic market conditions and passenger demand fluctuations to capture and implement potentially lucrative Indian routes since SriLankan holds the largest market share. However, aligning with our corporate objective of being the most preferred Airline in Asia, our pivotal objective is to optimise the current route network and attain the leadership as a regional carrier. We increased the Delhi- Northern India flight frequency to 11 flights a week from daily frequencies in July 2017. Subsequently, due to the high market demand, we will further increase the Delhi frequencies to 13 flights per week this December and Mumbai frequencies to 14 per week in November 2017,” informs Tennakoon.
Currently, in terms of global operations, SriLankan Airlines directly operates to 40 destinations in 21 countries serving key capital cities in Europe, the Middle-East, the Far-East and the Indian subcontinent. However, there is a global expansion on cards as well. “Further, through codeshare operations, passengers have access to 64 additional destinations in 27 countries. Being the flagship carrier of Sri Lanka, SriLankan Airlines has augmented the operating structure in order to best serve the passenger demand in our key destinations. SriLankan Airlines will commence Melbourne operations on October 29, 2017. Our key focus is to develop strong connections for South Asian, Middle Eastern and European passengers into the Australasian region,” he adds.
“SriLankan Airlines holds the widest coverage in India, and India is Sri Lanka’s number one source of inbound tourist traffic” – Dimuthu Tennakoon Head-Worldwide Sales & Distribution SriLankan Airlines
