Will Oman Air challenge the Top Three ?

Oman Air was seen entering an ambitious growth path in the recent weeks, will it be able to reach Mid East’s top three, and make it a top four ?

Fast Facts

Oman Air was founded in 1981 and is largely owned by the Government of Oman. It remained as a silent, regional carrier till the beginning of 2009. One key reason for the change of direction is a change of leadership.

Change of Leadership

Mr. Peter Hill was appointed as the new Chief Executive Officer of WY in July 2008. Hill, a veteran of commercial aviation, started his aviation carrier at the age of 17 as a commercial trainee with British Airways. Then onwards he worked with Gulf Air, although he is most noticeable for his work with Emirates as a key executive from the beginning and most specially as the CEO of SriLankan Airlines. He deserves a word to be said about his tenure at SriLankan where he turned around an aging and loss making national carrier into a profitable one and steered the airline successfully throughout many hurdles such as a terrorist attack that destroyed half of the carriers’ fleet, the Boxing Day Tsunami that directly impacted Sri Lanka and SARS to name a few.

New Direction

Following the change of leadership, it appears that WY has decided to come out of its small position and aspire to become a leading carrier to the Middle East. This was signified with the launch of new long-haul flights to Europe and expansion of the fleet, which now includes one of the best cabin products in the sky.

New Destinations

The carrier launched five new destinations this year

It appears that the carrier is embarking on a hub and spoke model similar to Emirates and trying to achieve a share of the global traffic flows.

WY flies to 10 Indian destinations and this offers some underserved destinations such as Jaipur and Lucknow.

Oman Air has about a 55% share of all operations at Muscat and it offers nonstop service to 25 destinations.

The Fleet

Oman Air currently has a fleet of 18 aircraft, which consists of the following.

Note: Two A330-200s are leased from Jet Airways and are due to be returned following deliveries of the airline’s own aircraft.

As can be seen from the above list, Airbus A330 will form the airline’s long haul fleet while the Boeing 737 will be catering to the regional needs.

This in fact can be seen as a very good fleet composition given that the airline is unlikely to meet any heavy density routes in the near future. The airline is likely to stay true to this aircraft sizes, which is evident from the order for Boeing 787-8 s.

All aircraft are configured for two classes and the A330s feature a luxury cabin that can challenge the inflight products of many established airlines.

The Future Analysis

Most Arab countries do not have a large population and this is a key reason why most Arab carriers opt to build a network utilizing 6th freedom rights that carries a large number of transit traffic.
With the Oman’s population of around three million, there is no doubt that Oman Air will have to and will be following the same course.
However, with an ever increasing competition and a troubling economy that has so far affected travelling patterns, WY will have to differentiate itself and find its niche to grab a winning share.
The carrier certainly has figured this out very well and are offering their luxury product at regular rates.
Their new routes to Europe and the subcontinent are likely to bring them some good sales because of these reasons and they also have the support of the airport authority which plans to expand the airport’s capacity to 12 million passengers.
For the moment Oman Air does not seem to be competing head to head with the Top Three. And Oman Air does not seem to be having ‘huge’ orders or unrealistic targets too. This will make Oman Air a different carrier from the rest and the less congested environment at MCT itself will help WY attract transfer traffic. After all, starting small is good but it in fact never denies that WY can become big.
Muscat benefits from a strategical location as Emirates, Etihad and Qatar and with an owner that fully supports their expansion, Oman Air is well placed to become a different addition and a challenge to the Mid East Top Three. If everything goes right, the day that the Top Three becomes a Four will not be too far.

Note 1 : Flights to Colombo and Malé are scheduled to be launched on 24th October following a security clearance issue.

Photo copyright Christophe Ramos .