flydubai to launch flights to MAG Osmani Int?l Airport from April 1
Sylhet : flydubai, Dubai’s first low-budget airline, on March 5 announced that the carrier will be launching five direct weekly flights to MAG Osmani International Airport of Sylhet from April 1 and daily from May 4 onwards. The five hour plus flight will be operated by B737-800s.
Sylhet will be its third desination in Bangladesh. The Sylhet operation is in joint partnership with Regent Airways, Bangladesh.
FZ 595 will leave Dubai at 10:25 local time and arrive at Sylhet at 17:40 Bangladesh time. FZ 596 will depart Sylhet at 18:40 Bangladesh time and arrive at Dubai at 22:20 local time. A return ticket at Economy Class will cost about Tk 29000 inclusive of all taxes.
Commenting on the new announcement, Ghaith Al Ghaith, Chief Executive Officer at flydubai, said, “We are happy to welcome Sylhet, another previously underserved point, to our growing network of more than 90 destinations. This announcement sees our weekly service to Bangladesh grow to 34 flights, and we look forward to welcoming the people of Sylhet onboard flydubai.”
MAG Osmani International Airport is an international airport located 5 miles north-east of Sylhet in Bangladesh. The vast majority of passengers using the airport are expatriate Bangladeshis and their descendants from the Sylhet Division living in the United Kingdom and elsewhere in the world.
Work started in 2006 to upgrade the terminal facilities to enable handling of international flights. The improvements include construction of a new terminal building, two Jetways and a taxi-way. The work was finished in December 2008.
flydubai started flights to Chittagong, the country’s second largest city, in January 2011, providing another travel option to thousands of Bangladeshis who live and work in the UAE. flydubai started serving Dhaka in February 14, 2011.
The company was officially set up in March 2008 by the Government of Dubai, forming the city’s first low-cost airline. In June that year, flydubai announced its arrival by placing an order for 50 Boeing B737-800 NG aircraft at the Farnborough Airshow. That marked the start of a year’s planning and hard work to get flydubai off the ground.
Five years after its inaugural commercial flight, flydubai is now making more than 1,400 flights a week with over 500 pilots and 1,000 cabin crew taking thousands of passengers to destinations throughout the region.
Annual Results
flydubai, in its fifth year of operation, on March 3 announced its Annual Results for 2014 and reported a net profit of AED 250 million (US$ 68 million) an increase of 12.3 per cent compared to 2013 with total revenue of AED 4.4 billion (US$ 1.2 billion) for the 12-month period, ending December 31.
In a year that saw the airline add 23 new routes, creating a network of 86 destinations, flydubai also increased frequency on many of its existing routes. Weekly flight frequencies to Beirut increased from 14 to 21, to Kuwait from 53 to 77, to Muscat from 28 to 41, to Salalah from 3 to 5 and Tbilisi which went to a daily service. The airline now operates 1,400 flights per week.
Its network across its geographic focus grew by the number of routes in Africa (100 per cent), in Central Asia (66 per cent), Europe including Russia (40 per cent), the GCC (7 per cent), Middle East (30 per cent) and in the Subcontinent (38 per cent).
Aircraft deliveries
All aircraft delivered since August 2013 have been configured with Business Class. flydubai took delivery of eight new Next-Generation Boeing B737-800 aircraft and ended the year with a fleet of 43 aircraft.
In October, it completed to schedule its rolling retrofit programme to configure the existing aircraft in its fleet with Business Class. The first seven aircraft it received between 2009 and 2010 were not part of the retrofit programme.
Business Class
flydubai ended 2014 with 70 per cent of its routes offering Business Class. During the course of the year ahead, it will announce the remaining routes to receive this service and together with the successful completion of the 12-month retrofit programme flydubai will be able to offer a consistent product for its passengers across its network. It also enhanced the business class offering on the ground with the opening of the flydubai Business Lounge at Terminal 2, Dubai International.
Awards
flydubai received a number of Awards during the year recognising its easy to use, technically advanced inflight entertainment system, the achievement of its Cargo division to introduce electronic Air Waybills (e-AWB) across its operations, two Awards for the debut Sukuk issuance as well as the recognition for excellence in its sector by CAPA, the Centre for Aviation.
flydubai Cargo has secured ACC3 EU certification which will allow the airline to transport Cargo to the new European routes. The busiest cargo routes include Colombo, Doha, Juba, Kiev, Kuwait and Muscat. Continued demand for cargo services saw an average of 3,000 tons carried each month and revenue growth was 11.8 per cent compared to 2013.
Outlook for 2015
2015 will continue to be a demanding year due to the global socio-economic landscape. flydubai will see the remaining aircraft from its 2008 order delivered. As in 2014, flydubai launched its first new service of the year to Saudi Arabia. This saw the first international flight land at Nejran on January 10 and became flydubai’s 12th point in Saudi Arabia. In March, a three times a week service to Chennai in India will start.
Ghaith Al Ghaith, commenting on the outlook for flydubai, said, “We will end 2015 with a fleet of 50 aircraft. Together with the new route launches this is an endorsement of the strategy we set out at the beginning and underlines the achievements of the past six years. I’m grateful to the team at flydubai for helping us to ensure that we are well positioned for sustained growth in the years ahead as we start to prepare for the new deliveries in 2016 and the first deliveries of the 737 MAX 8s in 2017 bringing further efficiency to our fleet.”
