Air Transport

Thai AirAsia plans to increase its proportion of international services due to relatively few growth opportunities within Thailand.

The low-cost carrier has a 50:50 split between international and domestic services, but that will increase to 70:30 in favour of the international services within the next five years, says CEO Tassapon Bijleveld. This is because the domestic market is saturated, he adds.

"When we started, we wanted to fill up the local market so we started by going to all the big Thai cities," he says. The carrier has filled the market with a frequency of daily flights on the major trunk routes, he adds.

"Now that our objective has been fulfilled, we are now expanding internationally," he says.

Thai AirAsia, for example, is working to get regulatory approval to launch a service in December from Bangkok to Mumbai. It is also looking at Bangkok-Hangzhou, but there is no certainty this will launch because "it is a long flight and we are concerned about the fuel price," he says.

On 15 November, Thai AirAsia will establish Phuket as its second international hub, after Bangkok. In the second quarter of 2010, it hopes to make Chiang Mai, in Thailand's north, its third international hub, says Tassapon.

The airline has a fleet of 10 Airbus A320s and six Boeing 737s, and will add two more A320s this year, he says.

In the three months to 30 June, Thai AirAsia made a loss of 81 million Thai baht ($2 million). However, Tassapon says that the carrier will definitely make a profit" for the full year.