Budget operator Cebu Pacific is making no apologies for planning to configure its newly ordered Airbus A330-300s with the “the highest seat density in the world” for the type, as the carrier is targeting the cost conscious migrant Filipino worker for its new low-cost, long-haul service.
Last month Cebu Pacific announced plans to acquire up to eight A330s widebodies to support flights from Manila to markets in Australia, the Middle East and parts of Europe, as well as to the United States.
The airline, which currently operates a fleet of Airbus A320 family aircraft and ATR 72 turboprops, plans to fit the A330s with about 400 seats and claims it will offer a 31in seat pitch to passengers.
By comparison, Philippine Airlines’ A330s are equipped with 300 seats, Cebu Pacific president and CEO Lance Gokongwei told delegates today at the Low Cost Airlines World conference in Singapore.
Italian manufacturer Geven’s high-density seating, which recently received offerability from Airbus, is under study by Cebu Pacific. “We are considering Geven, [but] have not made a final seat selection,” Gokongwei told the APEX editor’s blog.
The Cebu Pacific CEO also reveals that the carrier is “considering various options for [inflight] Wi-FI” for the A330s.
Noting that some 11 million Filipinos – or one in ten members of the population – live aboard, Gokongwei says the carrier will offer the “lowest fares possible” on point-to-point flights, and will maintain the ‘a la carte’ model it uses on its narrowbody and regional services.
“We believe in an unbundled product,” says Gokongwei, including charging for hot meals on the long-haul flights.
He says that when Cebu Pacific was mulling whether to offer long-haul service, it decided that the cost differential would have to be 30% better than other carriers on those routes to pursue the service.
Malaysian carrier AirAsia X pioneered the long-haul, low-cost model, though its journey has not been all smooth sailing. The carrier recently announced it will cease operating service to Europe at the end of March. Company CEO Azran Osman Rani, also a speaker at today’s event, says it has seen demand “contract” as a result of the “economic slowdown in Europe”.
Additionally, he believes there is over-capacity in the market that does not match demand. AirAsia X will instead focus on growth opportunities in Australia, China, Japan and Korea.
Singapore Airlines’ new low-cost, medium-haul carrier Scoot, which will launch Boeing 777 service around mid-year, agrees with Osman Rani’s assessment of the European market. Europe “is not [a] particularly attractive proposition”, says Scott CEO Campbell Wilson, noting that the current cost of fuel does not help.
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[...] In 1997, I flew down to Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil, where the Embraer ERJ-145 was built, to take delivery of an aircraft for Continental Express. On the way home, we spent a day and a half in Martinique. At the airport as we waited for our ride to the hotel, we saw passengers boarding a CorseAir Boeing 747 to France. Our customs agent asked us to guess how many seats the plane had. No one guessed more than 400. But it was 24 in business class and 558 in coach — all the way back to France. So I didn’t raise an eyebrow when I read that Philippines budget airline Cebu Pacific will cram 400 seats onto its Airbus A330s, which normally seat 300, reports the APEX Editor’s blog. [...]