Copa Colombia is planning further international expansion as intense competition in Colombia's domestic market prompts the carrier to direct additional capacity to international routes.
Copa Colombia president Roberto Junguito says Cancun and Havana will become the carrier's seventh and eighth international destinations in mid December. Junguito says both routes will initially be served with one weekly flight.
The carrier last month launched a daily Bogota-Mexico City service, giving the carrier six international destinations. Copa Colombia, which until last month was known as Aero Republica, also currently serves Panama City, Guayaquil, Quito, Guatemala City and San Jose, Costa Rica. All these routes are served non-stop from Copa Colombia's Bogota hub except Guatemala City and San Jose, which are served via Panama City.
ATI first reported in August that Copa Colombia was planning to add both Havana and Mexico City in October. Speaking to ATI and Flightglobal sister publication Airline Business last week, Junguito explains there was a delay in securing the required authorities from Cuba. As a result the carrier initially operated three Bogota-Havana charter flights in October. Scheduled traffic rights have now been secured for the route, allowing Copa Colombia to finally begin scheduled services next month.
Junguito says one weekly flight for the Cancun and Havana routes is sufficient as these are leisure destinations. He points out flights the other days of the week are also available via Panama City should passengers not wish to spend the entire week in Cuba or Mexico.
Copa already serves both Havana and Cancun from its Panama City hub. The carrier earlier this year increased its Havana service to five daily frequencies and next month will increase its Cancun service to three daily frequencies. Both Copa and Copa Colombia have frequent Panama City-Bogota services.
Copa Holdings CEO Pedro Heilbron told analysts last week that Copa Colombia will continue to grow its international capacity, primarily through more frequencies on its current routes to Panama and new routes from Colombia to Copa's Panama City hub. But he says more point-to-point routes such as Bogota to Mexico City, Cancun and Havana will also be considered.
"Going forward a smaller portion of Copa Colombia capacity will be assigned to the domestic Colombia market, where very aggressive fare competition has affected the profitability of that market," Heilbron says.
Copa Colombia has seen its domestic market share slip as a result of fast expansion at low-cost carrier Aires, which is now in the process of being acquired by LAN. Through the first eight months of this year, Copa Colombia had a 15% share of the domestic market, compared to 55% at Avianca and 21% at Aires. For the same period last year Copa Colombia had a 17% share of the domestic market, which put it ahead of Aires but still way behind market leader Avianca.
Heilbron points out back in 2005, before Copa acquired Aero Republica, the carrier did not have any international services. International routes now account for one third of the carrier's total capacity, and next year Heilbron says this figure will be even higher.
In its first phase of expansion after being acquired by Copa, Aero Republica launched flights from several Colombian cities to Panama City, where its passengers are able to connect across the Americas on Copa-operated flights. Over the last year the carrier has started focusing on other international destinations, starting with Guayaquil in December. Junguito says opening seven new stations, including Havana and Cancun next month, within one year represents "a major undertaking for a company of our size".
Heilbron says while Copa will look to add more point-to-point routes out of Bogota, Copa will be careful not to "cannibalise" any of its Panama City routes which now rely partly on connecting traffic from Colombia.
Copa Colombia, which previously only operated only E-190s in all-economy configuration, added its first 737-700 in June to support its international expansion. The carrier also installed business class earlier this year on three of its 13 E-190s, allowing the carrier to offer two classes on some of its international routes.
Junguito says Copa Colombia's two 737-700s are now being used on its one daily Bogota-Mexico City service as well as one of its frequencies on the following routes: Bogota-Panama City, Medellin-Panama City, Bogota-San Andres and Bogota-Medellin.
Junguito told ATI in August the carrier would also use one of its 737-700s on its Bogota-Quito route. But he now says this plan is scrapped in order to maintain reliability for its new Mexico City service. He says the two aircraft are now scheduled so that the second 737-700 is available relatively quickly if needed as a back-up for the Mexico City flight.
Copa Colombia earlier this year also applied for traffic rights for the Bogota-Miami route. Junguito says the carrier has secured the required rights from the Colombian side and is now waiting for authorisation from the US side. Once this is secured Copa Colombia will determine whether it will go forward and launch a Miami service.
Junguito says Copa Colombia also holds rights to several other international routes including Bogota to Lima and Santo Domingo, but has not yet decided on when or if to launch these flights.
For now he says Copa Colombia has no plans to add a third 737-700 but this could change once there is a decision to launch new international routes from Bogota.
Copa and Colombia already have the flexibility to freely swap aircraft through a fleet interchange agreement. Junguito says the rebranding of Aero Republica to Copa Colombia, which was implemented last month, makes fleet changes between the two Copa units even easier.
Source: Air Transport Intelligence news
