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Thai Smile Ready to Take the Challenge
3rd Dec 2013
The light premium airline, Thai Smile, is not perturbed despite the growing competition in the country's lucrative travel industry with the entry of foreign-assisted start-ups.
Sorajak Kasemsuvan, THAI president, is confident that the one-year old airline will be able to weather the competition as it has its own captive market, different from either full-service or low-cost carrier.
The airline executive has acknowledged the growing competition with the arrival of several carriers in the market. But he said the airline is looking for ways to keep its market share.
Another senior airline official, Chokchai Panyayong, also expressed his optimism of the airline's performance stating that its passenger traffic will continue to climb at a double-digit growth.
He, however, chose to keep mum on whether the airline will downsize or expand its operations in the near future, when sought for comments on the airline's future.
Thai Smile is expected to continue its growth momentum next year, considering that the European market has not fully recovered yet, resulting to the discontinuation of several THAI services to the continent.
While the European travel market for Thai Airways is still in the doldrums, the future for premium-class segment still looks rosy for Thai Smile. The airline official said that the light-premium airline can cater to almost every segment in the domestic and regional travel markets.
In early November this year, it launched its direct service from Bangkok to Chongqing and Changsha, both in China. The two routes were the 7th and 8th direct link to China by Thai Smile. On these routes, the light-premium airline is in a head-to-head competition with AirAsia. Though they operate from two different hubs, Thai Smile at Suvarnabhumi and AirAsia at Don Mueang. Thai Smile, though, would have to battle it out with AirAsia in terms of ticket price, as the latter offers up to 10% lower than the former.
Chongqing, a megacity located in the Southwest region, is one of the major economic and cultural centers in China. The urban core has a population of close to 7 million but the entire municipality has a whopping 29 million inhabitants. Being a major manufacturing center, especially in the production of automobiles, motorcycles, heavy machinery and electronics, its GDP is growing rapidly at 12% per annum.
Chinese travelers from the region has been growing, primarily due to the tropical allure of Thailand's popular destinations such as Bangkok, Phuket and Chinag Mai. Thai Smile serves Chongqing three times per week.
Thai Smile is wholly-owned and operated by Thai Airways International. It also holds 39.2% stake in Nok Air, a budget airline. The airline was launched by THAI only last year and keeps a fleet of 10 all-Airbus A320 aircraft.
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