Singapore Airlines to use partners to boost North America network

Singapore Airlines is getting jittery over its presence in North America. The airline’s codeshare partnership with US Airways will end in July 2014, thus leaving it with the sole codeshare partner Virgin America.

The airline wants to aggressively expand in the North American aviation market and is looking up to its partners for this. Singapore Airlines is already being helped by its partners such as Virgin Atlantic Airways, Air Canada and All Nippon Airways in providing air connectivity to various North America destinations for its gateways in Europe and North Asia.

Singapore Airlines recently got yet another partner in Asiana Airlines to help it with its expansion in North America. The airline wants even more international carriers as partners to help solidify its foothold in North America. Media reports said that the U.S. connections will further be bolstered with Turkish Airlines and EVA Air joining Singapore Airlines as its partners.

Four gateways being currently served by Singapore Airlines in the United States include New York, Houston, San Francisco and Los Angeles. The airline depends on its various partners to offer services to other destinations.

The airline is currently not offering nonstop flights to the United States after it stopped plying its all-business class A340-500 flights to Newark and Los Angeles in mid-2013.This resulted in a significant decline in its total seat capacity by 16 percent. Singapore Airlines disclosed that the first class and business class both saw a sharp decline of 26 percent, while in economy class the decline was of 12 percent.

Realizing its reduced presence over the years in North America, Singapore Airlines now desperately wants to turn the tide in its favor by seeking increased partnerships all across the Pacific and Atlantic. While considering this as a prudent alternative in filling the void in North America, the airline also wants to emphasize on enhanced partnerships for improving its network connectivity vastly. The airline has in past three years added 8 new partners while simultaneously trying to expand others.

Singapore Airlines has over the past decade downsized its U.S. network by gradually stopping services from Newark (via Amsterdam), Vancouver (via Seoul), Las Vegas (via Hong Kong) and Chicago (via Amsterdam). Earlier, the airline also provided nonstop flights services to Los Angeles via Taipei.

Based on its seat capacity, Singapore Airlines is presently the 9th largest Asian carrier to operate in the U.S. aviation market. The airline has slipped significantly in its rankings, while other North Asian carriers have fast bolstered and expanded their U.S. operations.

Aviation experts said that Singapore Airlines finds itself in a disadvantageous position as the geographic location of Singapore doesn’t allow it to cover the North American well. Nonstop flights have mostly proved to be a loss-making exercise. On the contrary, international carriers from the Philippines and North Asia have largely succeeded in operating nonstop flights to North America without using long-haul aircrafts such as Boeing 777-200LR and Airbus A340-500.

According to the experts, operating one-stop flights halfway across the world in the highly competitive market of today is quite difficult to sustain or earn impressive profits. They said that operating a second leg with the help of partners is the best and quite profitable option.