Qantas And Virgin Take Their Battle To A Higher Level

26th Sep 2014

The continuing rivalry between Qantas and Virgin seems to get more and more intense in recent years.

In their fresh battle, their bone of contention is the corporate and government sector. They try to outdo each other in attracting the most numbers of corporate and government travelers who fly frequently on trans-continental routes.

Both carriers have already announced that they will implement major improvements in business class of their respective fleet of A330 jets. These jetliners are the mainstay in trans-continental flights featuring business class equipped with the latest amenities and in-flight service for the discerning travelers.

Though additional and improved products and services on board increase operating costs to both airlines, they hope that they will be able to increase their captive market too and, as a result, boost yields and revenue.

The latest data available shows that business class tickets have gone up over the past 12 months, while the economy tickets have gone down despite the intense competition between the two major players. The decrease in cost of economy ticket was primarily due to the low demand in leisure travel market.

According to recent analysis, companies across the continent have been clamping down business travel on domestic flights with the aim of keeping corporate travel at a minimum.

Virgin Australia CEO, John Borghetti, admitted his airline is increasing capacity in its business class to cater to more business travel accounts coming from alliance partners that provide them sustained business in the sector. In fact, the yields in business class have been in the upswing more than those in the economy class.

Qantas, for its part, has been outfitting its fleet of A330s with new business class seats since December last year, but it will be able to complete the whole process until the middle of 2016.

The national flag carrier has recently announced that it is not adding capacity on domestic routes during the first half of the current fiscal.

Virgin, meanwhile, is using mostly a combination of wide-body B777 and A330 aircraft for its business class upgrade. The business class in these planes will be configured on a 1-2-1 layout to provide more space and comfort.