Garuda Indonesia needs special terminal

The airline company which has the second largest number of passengers in Indonesia, Garuda Indonesia, needs a special terminal at the terminal of Soekarno-Hatta (Soetta), Jakarta. The terminal is to anticipate the development of the airline business is expected to increase almost doubled in 2014 later.

In the year 2009, the total number of passengers carried by Garuda Indonesia more than 10 million people.

According to President Director of Garuda Indonesia, Emirsah Sattar, currently Garuda Indonesia already operates 74 aircrafts and by 2014 its fleet will increase to 116 units. Garuda Indonesia also has selected Jakarta as a base of operations. "We need a dedicated terminal for us," said the Emir in Jakarta. Nevertheless he was evasive that Garuda Indonesia is also required to participate to build its own terminal at the Soekarno Hatta airport. "Too much for it," said Emir.

For time being, Garuda Indonesia has formed a team to advise the Board of Directors. Angkasa Pura II as the organizer of Soekarno-Hatta airport.

As is known, PT. Angkasa Pura II will create a grand new design for the Soekarno Hatta airport. Grand design is expected to be completed later this year and will be implemented next year. Indonesia Minister of State Owned Entreprises, Mustafa Abubakar also have to allow private parties to participate in developing and managing Soekarno Hatta airport. Some news said, Schipol airport management (Netherland), Changi airport management (Singapore) and the airline Air Asia Group is interested in developing the biggest airports in Indonesia.

Picture:google.com

Garuda Indonesia: Osaka-Denpasar 7 times a week

To meet increasing market demand and in terms of improving service to their customer, starting on Thursday (07/10/2010), Garuda Indonesia has added frequencies of Osaka-Denpasar flight route (return) from the previous 5 times a week to 7 times a week.

Garuda Indonesia flights Denpasar-Osaka scheduled every day, departure from Denpasar (GA 882) at 0:55 pm and arrives in Osaka at 08.30 local time.

The plane departed again from Osaka (GA 883) at 11.00 local time and arriving in Denpasar at 17:15 pm. This flight using Airbus A330-300 aircraft with 257 seat capacity of 42 business-class and 215 economy class.

"The addition of Denpasar-Osaka flight frequency from five times to seven times a week is a Garuda Indonesia effort to meet the increasing of market demand as the continued growth of traffic between the two cities and to provide convenience for customer," said Garuda Indonesia VP Corporate Communications.

Osaka-Denpasar equipped by Garuda Indonesia Experience service, a unique service that combines the uniqueness of Indonesia in all flight services, from pre service, in, and post-flight.

In this flight, passengers will be served by cabin crew from Japan who is ready to assist the passengers in the ease of communication or need assistance during the flight.

In addition, the airline also offers on-board the Immigration Service. Through this service, passengers can comfortably managing the immigration document granting a visa on arrival on the plane so that the passengers do not need to queue at the immigration desk on arrival.

Today, besides serving the Osaka-Denpasar flight route, Garuda Indonesia also serve other cities in Japan, the Nagoya-Denpasar, 3 times a week, Tokyo-Denpasar 7 times a week, and Tokyo-Jakarta 7 times a week.

Mandala Airlines threatened degraded

Ministry of Transportation requested PT Mandala Airlines to immediately increase the number of its aircraft until the end of 2011. If not, the airline is threatened liquidated or degraded into charter airline in early 2012.

Director General of Civil Aviation Herry Bakti S Gumay reminded Act No. 1 / 2009 about Aviation, requires that all scheduled airline company has to operate a minimum of ten aircraft began in 2012. Five of the aircraft must be owned status, and other five aircraft may rent.

According to Herry many of Mandala Airlines planes has returned to the lessor  as the company policy. "The aircraft rental rates once considered too expensive, so Mandala Airlines looks for a new lessor. Currently Mandala only operate five units planes and all its are rental," said Herry. The five aircraft operated by Mandala Airlines are Airbus A320s and A319s. Herry added that if Mandala Airlines can not buy five planes more until the end of 2011, they must merge with another airline or turned into charter airline.

On June 21, Mandala Airlines has launched Online Fly’n Shop and  Diono Nurjadin – President Director of Mandala Airlines-  mention until the end of this year they will operate ten aircrafts. Currently Mandala Airlines has order 25 of Airbus A320s which will arrival based on the company needs. "Indeed for time being all of our aircraft are lease. But until the end of 2011, we will comply with a minimum of five owned aircraft and five chartered planes," said Diono.

Mandala Airlines has open many new international routes. For instance, on June 25, the airline serving the route from Jakarta to Singapore and Balikpapan to Singapore using Airbus A320 aircraft with a capacity of 180 seats. Followed by opening a route from Jakarta to Hong Kong on July 19, 2010 and from Jakarta to Macau in July 21, 2010 using an Airbus A319 with 144 seats capacity.

This year the target of Mandala Airlines can transport of 4 million passengers. Rose by 500,000 passengers compared to the realization of 3.5 million passengers last year.

4 of 12 Indonesia airports excess capacity

Aviation industry and the number of passenger planes in Indonesia continues to grow significantly even beyond the capacity of existing airports. According to PT Angkasa Pura II (Persero) or AP II, four of the twelve airports under its management have excess capacity. According to Director of AP II Tri S Sunoko the four airports which excess the capacity are Soekarno-Hatta Cengkareng - Jakarta, Polonia - Medan, Sultan Thana - Syafiuddin Jambi and Minangkabau Airport - Padang.

Polonia Airport in Medan, North Sumatera with a capacity of 900 000 passengers, are now serving 4.9 million passengers per year. Then Sultan Thana which has a capacity of 700 000 passengers have 900,000 passengers per year. While the Minangkabau Airport has served 2.8 million passengers per year, while its capacity is only 1.2 million passengers. "While the Soekarno-Hatta airport has a capacity of 22 million passengers have been serving 37 million passengers in 2009. That's why we will continue to increase the capacity by build a new airport terminal," said Tri.

The airport development projects and the construction of the new airport is ready to be done is Polonia Airport, which will be replaced with Kualanamu Airport. In the next two years, the airport is ready for use.

Last year, Lion Air has the domestic passengers at most 13.3 million (30.7%), Garuda Indonesia, as many as 8.39 million (19.28%), followed by Batavia Air around 6.10 million (14.02%) . While for the international route, most dominant is Garuda Indoensia Airlines with transporting 2.21 million (44.74%), followed by Indonesia AirAsia 1.98 million (40.09%), and the third position Lion Air around 383 584 passengers (7.74%).

Sriwijaya Air allocated 1260 seats to Australia

PT Sriwijaya Air was to be allocated 1260 seats for the opening of new routes to Australia. According to the Corporate Communication Manager of Sriwijaya Air, Ruth Hanna Simatupang, they already expressed interest to open a route from Jakarta to Perth since last year.

"We want to serve the route once a day by using Boeing 737-800 NG with maximum capacity of 180 seats. Our request was already submitted to the Indonesia Ministry of Transportation," said Hanna. She hopes the government can provide assurance of providing reserved seats at the end of this year, so that new routes could be served next year. "For a new route we are still engaged in preparing, while waiting for the Boeing 737-800 NG which will come next year," she added.

As is known, the Government of Indonesia and Australia agreed on an additional 4000 seats per week that can be utilized by the airlines of each country. Besides Sriwijaya Air, the other airline company PT Garuda Indonesia is also need as much as 1110 seats. Emirsyah Satar – President Director of Garuda Indonesia – said they want to add 666 seats to the route from Jakarta to Sydney from the frequency of four times a week to daily flights and 444 seats for Jakarta to Melbourne from three times a week to five times a week. For the record, Garuda Indonesia was already serving two routes using Airbus A330-200 with a capacity of 222 seats.

Citilink will separate from Garuda Indonesia

Garuda Indonesia plans to spin off (separation) of its strategic business units, Citilink. Spin-off will be done after the initial public offering (IPO) which scheduled on fourth quarter 2010.

"The most fast of the spin-off is in the second half of next year. If IPO will done this year, it takes approximately 3-6 months to conduct activities such as spin-off," said Director of Strategic and Technology Garuda Indonesia, Elisa Lumbantoruan.

According to Elisa, the spin-off was conducted aiming to isolate the resources side, as well as from the operational side of the two airlines. This is because the working culture of the two airlines will be very different due to class differences of the two airlines. Garuda Indonesia will go into Full Service class, while Citilink join in No-Frills or Low Cost Carrier (LCC) class. "In addition, the spin-off also can simplify the management of capital. For example make it easier to find partners or investors”, Elisa explained.

Citilink’s spin off has been scheduled since 2009. However. until now the spin off plan is intercept by a number of requirements in order to get SIUP (Aviation Business License) from the Ministry of Transportation, among them are the business plan and the procurement of the fleet. Since not get the SIUP yet, currently Citilink still become one with Garuda Indonesia. Citilink have the same flight number with Garuda Indonesia, which begins with the letters GA.