Cimber Air is to operate eight routes from Copenhagen on behalf of SAS Scandinavian Airlines, less than a year after SAS sold its minority stake in the Danish regional, citing strategic difficulties.
Cimber will operate routes on a wet-lease basis from Lyon in France, Newcastle and Aberdeen in the UK, Szczecin in Poland, Palanga in Lithuania and Vesteras in Sweden. The latter is conditional on obtaining "reasonable" rates from the airport, whose only other scheduled customer is Ryanair. Cimber is also in negotiation with two other airports. The carrier will operate 50-seat Bombardier CRJ200s on the new routes.
In March 2003, SAS sold its 26% stake in Cimber and subsequently ended the carrier's affiliated status, except for the frequent flyer programme, saying it would concentrate on those affiliates over which it had complete control, including SAS Commuter, based in Kastrup, Denmark. Cimber cut 15% of its workforce last year and is also undertaking wet-lease work on behalf of Maersk Air from Billund airport, also in Denmark. The airline will operate routes deemed too small for Maersk's Boeing 737s, flying to Munich, Milan, Oslo, Stockholm and Brussels with CRJ200s, starting from the winter season. The carrier says it will continue to seek similar co-operative deals.
Susanne Larsen, chief executive at Scandinavian Airlines Denmark, says the Copenhagen routes will "provide our customers with additional opportunities, and enable us to pick up more business that can strengthen our existing routes. In this way, we can maintain a traffic system that is far greater than local traffic would otherwise permit."
Source: Airline Business
