Thursday, July 30, 2009

Mandala Airlines "Go Regional"

Mandala Airlines

One of Indonesia national private airline, Mandala Airlines will intends to expand the network services to regional or "go regional" at the end of this year or latest early next year by cooperation with foreign airlines.

"The patterns of cooperation is not specified yet, by  code share or strategic alliance. The quickest is at the end of this year or latest early next year," said President Director of Mandala Airlines, Diono Nurjadin after  the signed Cooperation Ticket Payment via ATM with PT Bank Bukopin Tbk in Jakarta, Wednesday (29 / 7).

Diono explains, the regional routes which will aim are Australia, all the ASEAN countries, India and South China with the goal of the long flight from the Indonesia origin about 4-5 hours. "This is part of the Mandala Airlines' strategy to expand the network and at the beginning should cooperate with foreign airlines," he said. Diono believe these efforts will get good response from potential partners because, besides Mandala Airlines already revoked from the European Union (EU) flying restrictions together with four other airlines in Indonesia, also as corporation, this company continues to grow and develop.

"By the end of this year, number of Mandala Airlines passenger around 4-5 million people with at least two types of Airbus aircraft 320. At this time, we have total 11 planes and all of the planes are Airbus A-320 and A-319. Since January 2009, we only operate the only Airbus aircraft, "Diono said. Besides that, since 2007 Mandala Airlines also has order 30 new Airbus aircraft worth 2.3 billion U.S. dollars and will come in stages, starting in 2011. "All the ordered aircraft are just a 'leasing' with tenor 4-12 years," he said.

Currently Mandala Airlines serve up to 19 destination cities in Indonesia and provides seating capacity 550,000 passengers per month. Mandala Airlines is also prepared to obtain a certificate from the IATA IOSA on this year.

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