Virgin Australia to Enter Codeshare with All Nippon Airways

27th Dec 2015

Virgin Australia could soon be signing a codeshare agreement with All Nippon Airways (ANA). The Japanese airline is currently searching for a codeshare partner for the Austrian market. The partnership would likely cover Australian domestic routes.

Virgin Australia and All Nippon Airways already have an interline deal that allows the Japanese airline to provide passengers to its Australian partner's domestic flights, however, ANA is looking to build a stronger partnership, beyond interlining.

ANA already operates daily to Australia, having started a service to Sydney on 11th December.

The biggest obstacle to Virgin Australia and ANA signing a codeshare agreement lies in the fact that the Australian operator does not want to put its code on All Nippon Airways' flights between Sydney and Tokyo. The reason for this is that Virgin Australia already has the Japanese market covered with the Singapore Airlines partnership.

The Japanese airline has also expanded its current codeshare agreement with Air New Zealand, which now includes its new Australia flight and allowing ANA to put its code on Tokyo flights Air New Zealand operates, making the deal reciprocal.

In the meantime, officials from Air Nippon Airways have revealed their plans for adding several more routes to Australia. Currently, the most likely destinations are Perth and Melbourne. But, before that, ANA executives said, they first want to make sure that the Tokyo-Sydney route runs effectively. Only then will the company move to other potential routes to Australia.

The idea for new routes may not be so farfetched and it could come to fruition sooner, rather than later. Tokyo-Sydney flights have a 90 per cent booked load factors for the remainder of this month and first flights (since 11th December) were in full capacity both in and out of Tokyo.

Japanese passengers have a lot to do with the early success of this service, as they bought 60 per cent of tickets for the route for this and the next month.