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European network carriers are not venturing outside their hubs either with the exception of Air France, which will deploy a 777 from LHR to Los Angeles, and a much talked about yet still vague plan by BA to operate a 757 with 82 seats from either Brussels or Paris to New York in June. More destinations might follow later in the year.
The Battle For Heathrow
One thing the OAA already is changing is the competitive landscape at LHR, until now the exclusive preserve of BA, Virgin Atlantic, UA and AA. "I would say it is not good news for the carriers that are operating at LHR today . . . and good news for all the other carriers," comments Gourgeon good-naturedly. So far, AF has been the only European airline to take advantage of the lifting of restrictions at LHR. "We will see how we manage this 'special situation'," he says, conceding, "It is a bit risky."
The daily LHR-LAX service is one piece of a broader jigsaw to gain market share in tandem with AF's SkyTeam partners. To give its US alliance partners the opportunity to commence services as quickly as possible and in conjunction with the start of the OS, Air France KLM Group made seven of its 27 slot pairs available to DL for a twice-daily to JFK and a daily service to Atlanta and to NW for dailies to Detroit, Minneapolis/St. Paul and Seattle. One pair went to Continental Airlines. CO is launching twice-daily services between LHR and its Newark and Houston hubs and purchased three slots in the gray market, two from GB Airways and one from Alitalia.
"With eleven [LHR] flights a day to seven destinations you can really try to attract some corporate customers," Gourgeon believes. "The size of our operations will not be comparable to BA's but we will become a significant competitor in terms of possible destinations." SkyTeam partners will co-locate in Terminal 4 early next year.
The price of a slot pair is a closely kept secret, but Alitalia recently disclosed that it sold three of its 13 Heathrow slots in three separate deals for a total of €92 million. It did not identify the purchasers, but reportedly CO, US Airways and BA bought one each. An airline chief executive, who insisted on anonymity, recently confirmed to this magazine that the price for a prime-time slot at LHR has exceeded $50 million.
US Airways President Scott Kirby declines to confirm the price, but he acknowledges that LHR is "by far the most valuable market on the transatlantic." US will start a daily service from Philadelphia later this month aboard an A330 and intends to add more services if it can acquire more slots. "We would like ultimately to have a daily service from at least Phoenix and Charlotte and a twice-daily from PHL," he says.
Kreeger is candid that "For us, open skies is a Heathrow story. That is where the competitive change is coming. We are, however, not just focused on LHR. We are also adding services to the rest of Europe." AA currently serves 11 European airports from seven US gateways and is adding a second daily to its new JFK-Stansted service and launching a daily JFK-Barcelona this month. It will commence a daily JFK-Milan Malpensa next month.
"Open Skies is both an interesting competitive challenge for us and an interesting opportunity," Kreeger emphasizes. The opportunity comes from the ability to switch two of its three Gatwick services, a daily DFW and a daily Raleigh/Durham, to LHR, lifting the number of destinations it operates to/from the airport to seven. He acknowledges that the new entrants at LHR will present a challenge to AA but believes the carrier's combination of frequency and destinations plus the recent improvements to its onboard premium/business class product and the upgrading of its facilities at LHR "will allow us to compete successfully with Air France and the other carriers."
Despite the restrictions, the UK-US market is the largest with almost 40% of total EU-US traffic in 2006, and Heathrow is the main gateway. LHR-New York JFK is the world's largest intercontinental route measured in terms of seats offered, while LHR-Chicago O'Hare is No. 3, according to OAG.
