Airline News in Brief 09 August 2026

Emirates and South African Airways expand codeshare: Emirates and South African Airways (SAA) announced an expansion of their codeshare partnership, enabling access to nine cities and establishing the start of a reciprocal codeshare agreement between both carriers. The expanded partnership opens more destinations across central and southern Africa, simplifying connectivity for customers. The expansion covers nine new routes including three domestic South African links connecting Johannesburg with Cape Town, Durban and Port Elizabeth, in addition to six regional routes linking Johannesburg with Kinshasa (Democratic Republic of Congo), Gaborone (Botswana), Windhoek (Namibia), Lusaka (Zambia), Harare (Zimbabwe) and Victoria Falls (Zimbabwe). Emirates and South African Airways have been partners for almost 30 years, marking one of the longest partnerships in Emirates’ portfolio. Since 1997, millions of passengers have benefitted from the partnership, with frictionless, single-ticket travel. This extension to the codeshare underscores the ongoing commitment to providing greater access, convenience and choices to travellers from South Africa and neighbouring countries. Scoot closes the gap between customer feedback and outcomes: Scoot, the low-cost subsidiary of Singapore Airlines (SIA), is using AI capabilities from Qualtrics to compress the time between hearing a customer signal and acting on it — turning what once took analysts hours, into minutes, and driving measurable improvements across its digital booking experience.  The partnership, which began in 2018, has helped Scoot exceed internal targets across its booking platform, app, Manage My Booking pages, and member login functionality. Speed of operation is a key priority for Scoot. Generally, passengers book, fly and move on. By the time a traditional customer experience team surfaces patterns from open-text feedback — reading through comments, tagging themes, building reports and implementing the right next steps — the moment to act would have passed. The Qualtrics platform has changed this. At the end of every booking, Scoot invites customers to share feedback on the digital experience they just had. The survey is short and focused on booking experience attributes the airline can directly influence, such as web design, page speed, and user-friendliness. That creates a continuous, granular signal. But a signal without speed is just data. Scoot’s breakthrough has been compressing the time between hearing what customers say and doing something about it — and AI is what makes that compression possible. Akasa Air launches Akasa Elevate loyalty programme: Akasa Air has launched Akasa Elevate, its loyalty programme designed to make every journey more rewarding. Built around what matters most to its customers, Akasa Elevate enables members to earn Elevate Points on eligible flights and ancillary products & services, unlock exclusive benefits through fast and easy tier progression, and enjoy India’s most rewarding way to fly. Akasa Elevate is designed to reward customer loyalty with greater value, personalised recognition and enhanced travel benefits, while building on the warm and dependable service that customers have come to expect from Akasa Air. Vinay Dube, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Akasa Air said, “As we celebrate four years of Akasa Air, we do so with immense gratitude to the millions of customers who have chosen to fly with us. Their trust and loyalty have been central to our journey and have inspired us to continually enhance the Akasa experience. Akasa Elevate reflects our philosophy of putting customers at the heart of everything we do. Designed to be simple, accessible and genuinely rewarding, the programme allows members to start earning benefits from their very first journey while providing a faster and more intuitive path to greater recognition. By combining meaningful rewards, seamless experiences and personalised recognition, we are strengthening the relationship with our customers and creating even more reasons for them to choose Akasa every time they fly. As we enter our fifth year, our focus remains firmly on disciplined growth, operational excellence, employee centricity and delivering differentiated experiences for our customers.” TransNusa launch twice-daily flights between Jakarta and Bangkok: TransNusa has officially commenced direct scheduled service connecting Jakarta, Indonesia, and Bangkok, Thailand. The new route marks a major milestone in TransNusa’s rapid international expansion, adding to its established network of regional routes including Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Perth, and Guangzhou. Operating from Soekarno-Hatta International Airport to Suvarnabhumi Airport, the daily services are operated by the airline’s modern fleet of Airbus A320 aircraft. TransNusa Airlines also took a major step forward to boost air connectivity and tourism between Indonesia and Thailand by signing a milestone Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) on August 4. Hong Kong Air Cargo launches freighter service from Mumbai: Hong Kong Air Cargo has expanded its India network with the launch of its dedicated freighter service from Mumbai, marking another significant milestone in its partnership with Aeroprime Group, its Cargo General Sales & Service Agent (GSSA) in India. The new Mumbai service enhances Hong Kong Air Cargo’s presence in India, offering inbound service to India while offering exporters increased cargo capacity and improved connectivity to Hong Kong and onward global markets. The Mumbai expansion reinforces Hong Kong Air Cargo’s long-term commitment to the Indian market while highlighting Aeroprime Group’s expertise in driving airline cargo growth through strategic market development and commercial excellence. For Editorial Inquiries Contact: Editor Matt Driskill at [email protected] For Advertising Inquiries Contact: Head of Sales Sally Passey at [email protected]