Batik Air to take on Garuda
Lion group’s Batik Air is taking on Garuda Indonesia in the mainline market with an aggressive expansion plan.
Batik Air will be increasing its fleet this year to 16 aircraft and aims to launch services to 12 new domestic destinations in Indonesia, as well as launch its first international service.
“Our first international destination will be Singapore and we aim to have more than a daily service on the route from Jakarta Soekarno-Hatta International Airport to Singapore Changi Airport,” says Batik Air CEO, Capt. Achmad Luthfie.
“We chose Singapore as our first international destination, because we can see that demand on the route continues to increase,” he says.
The airline also plans to more than double its domestic network this year to 22 destinations from ten. The new domestic points this year will be: Banjarmasin, Batam, Gorontalo, Kendari, Medan, Padang, Palembang, Palu, Timika, Tarakan and Solo. Batik Air will also be resuming services on the Jakarta-Bali Denpasar route.
These new services will increase Batik Air’s daily flights to 100 from 36.
The airline also plans to launch services in 2015 to another five domestic destinations, although three will be dependent upon the airport runways being extended to accommodate the airline’s aircraft.
Batik Air operates six 737-900ER aircraft configured with 168 economy-class and 12 business-class seats.
The airline will be adding its first A320 in July and will be getting a total of six this year. Batik Air will be the first airline in the group to operate the A320. These aircraft will have 144 economy-class seats and 12 business-class seats. The airline is also adding four 737-800s in this year’s second-half and these will have 150 economy-class seats and 12 business-class seats.
