What is Virgin Australia's strategy (post-administration)?

[Mr H]

VA have quite obviously decided the East Coast is where there International operations are at, shame they decided to pull out of Port Hedland which had been operated even in Skywest days & no future prospects they will return to PER - DPS. JQ is a fierce competitor on the route but return $349 - $399 would be compelling to capture the mid market, premium & mining crowd.

Since they got rid of their widebodies, I guess the routes they picked are where they think customers will find narrowbodies acceptable - so east coast short haul international routes where competitors are not offering widebodies.

 

[Harrison_133]

VA have quite obviously decided the East Coast is where there International operations are at, shame they decided to pull out of Port Hedland which had been operated even in Skywest days & no future prospects they will return to PER - DPS. JQ is a fierce competitor on the route but return $349 - $399 would be compelling to capture the mid market, premium & mining crowd.

After the ill-fated attempt at Tiger operating to Bali (in 2016/17?), VA never did resume PER-DPS but maybe with Garuda/Citilink/Batik not offering the route anymore it could be more viable.

Also looks like the Melbourne to Denpasar route will become a 2 daily service.

Since they got rid of their widebodies, I guess the routes they picked are where they think customers will find narrowbodies acceptable - so east coast short haul international routes where competitors are not offering widebodies.

I’m not sure what widebodies have to do with this? These are all markets VA have operated 737s on for years and are simply returning to, and in the case of Bali/Fiji they are going up against widebodies and have done so before (JQ 787 to DPS, FJ A330/A350 to NAN).

 

[Saab34]

They are going to need more 737s soon. I would assume more MAX8s will be moved forward especially if -10 is delayed which looks the case.

 

[HS-TQE]

I do wonder whether if VARA's upcoming 73Gs could also suit the PER-DPS route (no J), possibly even the A320s could operate in their downtime between FIFO runs.
The 'cashed up' folks could just book EconomyX.

 

[Harrison_133]

I do wonder whether if VARA's upcoming 73Gs could also suit the PER-DPS route (no J), possibly even the A320s could operate in their downtime between FIFO runs.
The 'cashed up' folks could just book EconomyX.

I don’t see that happening at all. They’ll need to use aircraft that are registered to Virgin Australia International because VAI hold the Indonesian traffic rights and not VARA. That was part of the problem they had with the Tiger flights. They tried to operate Tiger operating on the VAI certificate and that didn’t hold up for very long with the Indonesian authorities.

They are going to need more 737s soon. I would assume more MAX8s will be moved forward especially if -10 is delayed which looks the case.

SQ just retired 2 more 737-800’s. Maybe they could look at picking up the rest of the ex Silk Air aircraft?

Also some of the older Virgin Blue birds are getting quite old. VOK/VOL/VON/VOO are all 2003 builds. They’d have to be coming up for replacement soon. If not their cabins could do with a refresh.

 

[HS-TQE]

After the ill-fated attempt at Tiger operating to Bali (in 2016/17?), VA never did resume PER-DPS but maybe with Garuda/Citilink/Batik not offering the route anymore it could be more viable.

Also looks like the Melbourne to Denpasar route will become a 2 daily service.

I’m not sure what widebodies have to do with this? These are all markets VA have operated 737s on for years and are simply returning to, and in the case of Bali/Fiji they are going up against widebodies and have done so before (JQ 787 to DPS, FJ A330/A350 to NAN).

VA 1.0 also operated their A330s alongside the 737s on SYD/BNE-NAN at some point.
The A330 was rotated on a once weekly PER-BNE flight to operate a weekend BNE-NAN service, and was rotated back on BNE-PER on a Sunday.

 

[Bagpuss]

VA 1.0 also operated their A330s alongside the 737s on SYD/BNE-NAN at some point.
The A330 was rotated on a once weekly PER-BNE flight to operate a weekend BNE-NAN service, and was rotated back on BNE-PER on a Sunday.

Lets not forget VA1.0 operated B777-300 aircraft to coughet.

V Australia chops services to South Africa and Thailand

Virgin Blue will axe its loss-making long-haul V Australia services to South Africa and Thailand, the airline announced today, barely after the fanfare of their launches has died down.

www.traveller.com.au

Don't expect to see that coming back either! ;-)

 

[HS-TQE]

Lets not forget VA1.0 operated B777-300 aircraft to coughet.

V Australia chops services to South Africa and Thailand

Virgin Blue will axe its loss-making long-haul V Australia services to South Africa and Thailand, the airline announced today, barely after the fanfare of their launches has died down.

www.traveller.com.au

Don't expect to see that coming back either! ;-)

That was back when VAustralia was a subsidiary of VB Holdings.
HKT and JNB from memory was axed when VB got turned into VA 1.0 by the then-incoming CEO + then-incoming owners, and changed the 777 schedules to daily BNE and SYD to LAX and 3x weekly AUH, the later obviously influenced by one of the then-owners.

 

[henrus]

shame they decided to pull out of Port Hedland which had been operated even in Skywest days

Skywest was originally used F100's on the route which meant smaller aircraft. VA struggled to make it work with larger 737-800s and even in the earlier days using A320's.

Strategic briefly tried Port Headland to Bali using A320's and even they cut it very qucikly saying they couldn't make it work.

no future prospects they will return to PER - DPS. JQ is a fierce competitor on the route but return $349 - $399 would be compelling to capture the mid market, premium & mining crowd.

At most they'd put 1 flight per day on which compared to JQ's 3 per day and Air Asia's 1-2 (noting Air Asia will move to 3 flights in peak times) would be hard for VA to keep up.

 

[HS-TQE]

Batik/Malindo and Citilink (and Garuda mainline before them) also flew PER-DPS. They had up to 4 airlines on this specific 'cashed up' tourist route during its peak.

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

At least VAi on those routes have a J cabin, and good as QF does not fly those routes directly, and JQ does not have a J cabin.

 

[HS-TQE]

At least VAi on those routes have a J cabin, and good as QF does not fly those routes directly, and JQ does not have a J cabin.

QF operates the domestic 738s with J recliners on SYD/MEL to DPS daily as well.

 

[jase05]

QF operates the domestic 738s with J recliners on SYD/MEL to DPS daily as well.

Thankfully GA are still running SYD-DPS. Hopefully the frequency increases in the coming months as it’s the only decent way to get direct to DPS

 

[ozstamps]

Perhaps this is the big strategy secret announcement???

WHOOOOOOPEEEE .. all of 2000 points to fly overseas!

They'll be killed in the rush.

Who in there really thinks anyone will take notice of such a lame intro for overseas flights starting up?

 

[Harrison_133]

From looking at the VA website, seems Airnorth will be operating some flights for Virgin on their E190s from 27th June. Brisbane-Townsville looks pretty regular until mid-July, with a couple of Brisbane-Darwin flights too.

 

[henrus]

seems Airnorth will be operating some flights for Virgin on their E190s

Do you mean alliance?

 

[HS-TQE]

Do you mean alliance?

Nope. Technically wetleased (or damp-leased) to Airnorth.
Alliance has leased out VH-UYC and VH-UYR to Airnorth in a all-white livery.

 

[jase05]

Nope. Technically wetleased (or damp-leased) to Airnorth.
Alliance has leased out VH-UYC and VH-UYR to Airnorth in a all-white livery.

Yuck
From memory they are all Y

 

[Harrison_133]

Do you mean alliance?

They are Alliance planes yes, but leased out to and crewed by Airnorth. The VA site also refers to “TL” as the operator, so the agreement to operate would be between Virgin and Airnorth.

Post automatically merged: Jun 20, 2022

Yuck
From memory they are all Y

From the Airnorth site. So they still have the Copa configuration.

 

[sqrt()]

They are Alliance planes yes, but leased out to and crewed by Airnorth. The VA site also refers to “TL” as the operator, so the agreement to operate would be between Virgin and Airnorth.

Post automatically merged: Jun 20, 2022

View attachment 282161
From the Airnorth site. So they still have the Copa configuration.

Pressurised cabin! Wow, VA really are treating us.