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Dubai: British Airways is likely to order new aircraft later this year despite daunting challenges of high fuel costs and stiff competition, a senior official said.
"We are going to announce new orders by the end of 2006 as lack of additional capacity is restricting our growth in some areas," Paul Starrs, British Airways' new commercial manager for the Middle East and Pakistan, told the media on Tuesday, without giving details of the deals.
Premium service
The airline is embarking on a new business strategy in the region to face off stiff competition on the UAE-UK routes following a price war initiated by Virgin Atlantic.
"This structure has been put in place in an effort to streamline our operations while still maintaining our award-winning premium service and giving our customers and trade partners contact with experts in each field," he said.
"The Middle East truly is a rapidly emerging market and I can onlys ee this continuing as connections to other parts of the world grow in the ever-expanding global market place.
"This structure has been put in place in an effort to streamline our operations while still maintaining our award winning premium service accross our product offerings."
He said, the new business strategy including restructuring has been initiated to face the challenge of high fuel cost and maintaining profitability.
"This year, British Airways' fuel bill is reaching £2.2 billion about £600 million more than the previous year. Our business strategy is to maintain a 10 per cent operational margin despite the high fuel costs and daunting challenges in the global market.
"Besides, the pension issue is another among many organisational challenges that we are tackling."
It is adding three flights to the 21 weekly flights on the UAE-London sector to meet the growing demand.
"The London-UAE routes are big enough for more competition," Starrs said. "However, the pressure is downwards as there are strong competition."
More flights to UK
British Airways currently operates 14 weekly flights to London Heathrow from Dubai, and will introduce a further three weekly flights from the end of October.
The airline also operates daily from Abu Dhabi to the UK capital's principal airport.
Starrs heads up the regional commercial operations having held several UK and global sales roles within the airline, as well as having developed and defined the carrier's UK corporate and travel agent dealing processes during his seven year British Airways' tenure.
Airline embarks on new business strategy
-- The airline is embarking on a new business strategy in the region to deal with stiff competition on the UAE-UK routes following a price war initiated by Virgin Atlantic.
-- The airline is adding three flights to the 21 weekly flights on the UAE-London sector to meet the growing demand.
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