SIA turns to nonstop long-haul flights as regional competition intensifies

It’s targeting premium flyers.

Direct long-haul flights to the United States and Europe are Singapore Airlines’ weapon of choice to counter the intense competition in the regional aviation market, the flag carrier revealed in its recently-concluded analyst briefing.

SIA CEO Goh Choon Phong said that revealed that the airline is expecting the delivery of seven Airbus A350s by 2018, which will operate non-stop from Singapore to the U.S.
SIA aims to introduce nonstop ultra-long haul flights to Los Angeles and New York. SIA had previously operated flights to these two cities, but operations were discontinued in 2013 as business conditions became unsustainable.

“For the A350 ultra-long haul, ultra-long range, when we mount it all the way non-stop to the US. With the seven aircraft everybody would know that we don't need seven to operate to two points, so obviously we'll be introducing other points. Two points that we used to operate was LAX and New York. We'll be looking at beyond that, obviously. And beyond the seven, whether we grow further, we shall see, but we'll keep our options open on that,” Goh said.

Apart from these seven aircraft, SIA is also expecting the delivery of medium-haul 787-10s and medium-haul A350 planes. 

These new planes will also allow SIA to grow its operations in Europe, Goh said, as A350s are more feasible to use compared to Boeing 777s thanks to their smaller capacity and have excellent fuel efficiency. 

“These non-stop operations will provide us with a competitive advantage over anyone who has to stop in between, which means that as we all know, premium traffic, particularly business traffic, would actually prefer non-stops. So that would allow us to actually capture that traffic. There will be a preference for those non-stops,” he said.