The SkyTeam alliance expects to add three new members this year, in addition to Saudia which joined the alliance a couple weeks ago. At the annual IATA conference in Beijing they announced dates for these new joins:
On June 28th, Middle East Airlines from Lebanon will be the next member to join SkyTeam. The alliance will welcome two additional members in 2012. Aerolíneas Argentinas is scheduled to join the alliance August 29thas the first South American member, strengthening SkyTeam network in the southern hemisphere. On November 15th, Xiamen Airlines, based in the flourishing Southeast China region, will further consolidate the alliance #1 position in Greater China.
Notably missing from this section of the announcement is a join date for previously announced prospective member Garuda International. Garuda will not be joining the alliance in 2012. They also won’t be joining in 2013. In what is being blamed on the carrier’s migration to a new IT platform and the associated migration efforts the join date for Garuda is now being pushed out to 2014.
Even with the Garuda date slipping SkyTeam is making big strides in growing its footprint globally this year. That’s good news for passengers in the various partner programs.
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The similarities between Air India’s ascension to Star Alliance and Garuda’s ascension to SkyTeam have a lot of similarities. Carriers on the rise service and fleet-wise, whose entry keeps on getting delayed because they are transferring to a non-antique IT system…
Hopefully things will end better for Garuda than they did for AI.
I don’t know that I’ve heard of AI being described as “on the rise” in any context lately. That’s a lot of optimism. 🙂
Not lately – when they first were joining the alliance. They had taken delivery of brand new 777s (with a great product), they were upgrading their IT, they were increasing domestic connectivity with the merger, etc.
All that momentum and optimism is gone now of course. But it was there a few years ago.
Aerolinas is a good addition. But I am not sure what value Middle East Airlines and Xiamen Airlines bring to the team.
Forgot about Saudia?
Saudia already joined; they are no longer pending. I mentioned that in the first sentence. 😉
Aerolineas is a good addition? In what dimension? It’s a horrible joke inside of Argentina, and once people from outside of Argentina start to fly it, they’ll think the same.
Aerolineas is a great airline that has improved enormously since it was bought back by the state. All brand new planes and great punctuality records makes it the best carrier in South America