As from January 6th, Brussels Airlines will stop flying the BRU-BOM-BRU route. Route was mainly operated by A332.

The extra capacity will instead enable frequencies extensions on destination such as BJL and DSS.

BOM was the sole Asian destination of SN (if we exclude TLV). YYZ and JFK remain the only year-round long haul destinations outside Africa. IAD is set to remain as seasonal (summer only) service.

Airline's press statement cited poor financial performances of the route as the main reason for this termination.

BOM was opened in aftermath of Jet Airways' closure of its BRU scissor hub (in Nov 2016 then moved to AMS) in March 30th 2017. It was the first Indian route of a Belgian carrier since's Sabena's Chennai route which was closed after Sabena's demise in 2001.


Of course pax are now urged and invited to book from BRU through FRA/ZRH/MUC/VIE... But this puts more uncertainty to SN's future long haul operation growth under the Eurowings umbrella.

Give your thoughts...

Not a massive shock. The few times I saw it boarding it didn't look terribly busy. SN know what they do well: move people between U.S Europe and Africa.
The brand is too well known to go to eurowings which sounds a bit low cost. They have a good brand and if they can keep these African routes growing and open new then they have a decent business.

jubaexpress wrote:

Not a massive shock. The few times I saw it boarding it didn't look terribly busy. SN know what they do well: move people between U.S Europe and Africa.

I'd remove U.S. from that sentence. They only serve 1 U.S. destination year round. They are a Europe-Africa airline.

I see Brussels Airlines' remaining long-haul remaining largely because of brand recognition. As for the A321neo, that would make sense for SN to expand its Africa reach by separating a lot of triangular routes. They really only need wide-bodies for the former Belgian colonies, JFK, and YYZ. I see SN remaining with likely just the A333s, likely ex-SQ or ex-CX (remember, they have one transitioning from EW to SN next year to replace an old 212t A333 as the lease expires).

I also see OS losing long-haul ops under its own name...and transitioning to Eurowings Europe (Eurowings' Austrian AOC); the major issue might be early lease termination on the two leased B772s (the other four are likely fully-owned by the LH Group). Long-haul under Eurowings can be done under A330s and A340s; some sourced externally and others within the existing group. The A346s could remain longer as 4-class planes out of FRA, replacing A343s and some A333s heading to Eurowings as 300-seat planes.

Should try Delhi

LH658 wrote:

Should try Delhi

I think BOM made more sense because of the diamond industry connection but I could be wrong on that. Either way if BOM isn't working, I doubt DEL would be any different.

I think very few European airlines will manage to keep on serving India in the future - especially once IndiGo enters the European market. Also, SN had to compete with Lufthansa for this market as they also offered connections from Belgium ... and very often at very, very low prices.

I fear that as time goes by, SN will lose on its importance especially as Lufthansa gets cozier and cozier with Ethiopian.

All flights effective 06JAN-19 now cancelled from all GDS reservations systems.

Round trip passenger demand between BRU and BOM/DEL in 2017 versus 2016 was as follows below:

BOM - 61,000 vs 42,000
DEL - 38,000 vs 37,000

I remember reading over the winter that they wanted to launch new BRU-LOS-LBV flights soon...any update on that?

Blerg wrote:

I fear that as time goes by, SN will lose on its importance especially as Lufthansa gets cozier and cozier with Ethiopian.

That doesn't make much sense to me since SN is LH.
SN will always be LH's arm in Africa. That is exactly why they bought the airline. ET just cannot offer LH what SN offers. Not even close.
What SN needs to do next is figure out how to incorporate N.America into their African business. The fact that their African routes all depart in the morning and arrive in the early morning should make SN the most convenient carrier between N.America and Africa but they have virtually no N.America presence.

Call me crazy, but should SN consider LAX? Like DC and NYC, I feel like LA could offer substantial feed for the African services...

SurfandSnow wrote:

Call me crazy, but should SN consider LAX? Like DC and NYC, I feel like LA could offer substantial feed for the African services...

Why ? LA isn't really a magnet for African immigrants minus Ethiopians. And that market is well covered by ET, TK, LH, and the ME3

Just to bring some reality into BRU-USA actual demand in 2017, it was as follows below:

*Round trip pax stats*

JFK - 174,000
EWR - 87,000
BOS - 31,000
PHL - 8,000
CLT - 5,000
IAD - 68,000
ORD - 48,000
MIA - 57,000
MCO - 12,000
ATL - 23,000
IAH - 14,000
DFW - 9,000
LAS - 15,000
SFO - 43,000
SEA - 11,000
LAX - 44,000
DEN - 16,000

I would prefer SN flying to SFO iso LAX because even though the demand level is almost the same, the average fare on P2P BRU-SFO-BRU flown in 2017 was + 34% higher hence better yields to be had on this long haul flight. BRU-SFO only needs to be flown 4 weekly A332s maximum as via SFO, SN pax can connect to many more UA cities on the West Coast due to the mega Star hub.

For SFO the SN strategy needs to focus on higher yielding EU bound pax ISO Africa bound as demand from SFO to West/Central Africa is nothing great at all. It can even just make SFO a summer seasonal route from 01JUN till 20SEP as thats the time when yields are at their highest.

As to U.S. routes, can anybody confirm whether Brussels is included in the JV between AC, LH, and UA?

airbazar wrote:

jubaexpress wrote:

Not a massive shock. The few times I saw it boarding it didn't look terribly busy. SN know what they do well: move people between U.S Europe and Africa.

I'd remove U.S. from that sentence. They only serve 1 U.S. destination year round. They are a Europe-Africa airline.

They serve JFK and YYZ year-round, unless I am mistaken. These are not insubstantial backwaters. Both large, international cities in their own right and with a large diaspora, and if necessary offer connections.

I don't think it's quite right to say they are an Africa - Europe airline, though it's part of it.

airbazar wrote:

Blerg wrote:

I fear that as time goes by, SN will lose on its importance especially as Lufthansa gets cozier and cozier with Ethiopian.

That doesn't make much sense to me since SN is LH.
SN will always be LH's arm in Africa. That is exactly why they bought the airline. ET just cannot offer LH what SN offers. Not even close.
What SN needs to do next is figure out how to incorporate N.America into their African business. The fact that their African routes all depart in the morning and arrive in the early morning should make SN the most convenient carrier between N.America and Africa but they have virtually no N.America presence.

SN flies to the major cities with the high value traffic which wouldn't touch ET for reasons for prestige and then filling up the back with the usual traffic. Also cities on the west for which a detour via Addis Ababa is a lot of flying in the wrong direction.

ET, however, offers vital connections to 'the rest' - secondary cities and third tier cities which SN would never go to.

superjeff wrote:

As to U.S. routes, can anybody confirm whether Brussels is included in the JV between AC, LH, and UA?

YES

behramjee wrote:

All flights effective 06JAN-19 now cancelled from all GDS reservations systems.

Round trip passenger demand between BRU and BOM/DEL in 2017 versus 2016 was as follows below:

BOM - 61,000 vs 42,000
DEL - 38,000 vs 37,000

I remember reading over the winter that they wanted to launch new BRU-LOS-LBV flights soon...any update on that?

Interesting count numbers. Based on crunching the numbers, SN was averaging an 85-86 percent load factor on BRU-BOM in 2017 (the A332s are configured J22-Y+32-Y218). This must be LH flexing its muscle wanting FRA and MUC (and to a lesser extent, ZRH) to be the group's premier hubs, basically putting SN in the major role of intra-Europe and to and from Africa.

What are the odds that SN ends up taking on the EW configuration on the incoming A333s? (For the A333s, it would be J16W21Y+40Y223.)

The 61,000 BrU bom BrU pax are not taken up by SN as it’s only the total market demand. Yes they have more than a 50% market share but EK and EY are also the other main players in this market segment.

Read a french article a few months ago mentioning rumors of BOM and YYZ getting axed. Let's see if YYZ sticks around.

A few weeks ago, when I checked fares from Kigali to Bombay, to my surprised, ET was not even close to be the cheapest !!
SN offered a non promotional return flight for 350ish EUR... too bad the route is suspended

airbazar wrote:

Blerg wrote:

I fear that as time goes by, SN will lose on its importance especially as Lufthansa gets cozier and cozier with Ethiopian.

That doesn't make much sense to me since SN is LH.
SN will always be LH's arm in Africa. That is exactly why they bought the airline. ET just cannot offer LH what SN offers. Not even close.
What SN needs to do next is figure out how to incorporate N.America into their African business. The fact that their African routes all depart in the morning and arrive in the early morning should make SN the most convenient carrier between N.America and Africa but they have virtually no N.America presence.

SN is not a profitable business which creates a headache for Lufthansa. Ethiopian on the other hand seems to be turning into a pan-African business with many new bases opening all around. I still think LH is trying to offload SN and have it replaced with Eurowings. Once this happens they will just replace SN on the profitable routes while the rest will be funneled via other Star Alliance hubs. BRU is just too close to AMS and CDG in order to ever become a major European hub, not to mention that a great deal of O&D is taken away from it by CRL.

airbazar wrote:

What SN needs to do next is figure out how to incorporate N.America into their African business. The fact that their African routes all depart in the morning and arrive in the early morning should make SN the most convenient carrier between N.America and Africa but they have virtually no N.America presence.

They're in a revenue-sharing joint venture with Air Canada and United. For all intent and purposes, they have non-stop flights between BRU and EWR, JFK, YUL, YYZ, IAD, and ORD. It may not be their metal, but they market and sell the flights and retain the revenues. Brussels Airlines has an extensive presence, brand recognition, and much less competition on the African continent so they find it more profitable to focus their marketing efforts on traffic from Africa to North America, than to focus on North American customers.

Blerg wrote:

I fear that as time goes by, SN will lose on its importance especially as Lufthansa gets cozier and cozier with Ethiopian.

The Lufthansa Group handed all but day-to-day operational control of all group airline Africa flights to Brussels Airlines, including the group's overall strategy for the continent. Brussels Airlines personnel in Brussels decide which Lufthansa Group carrier flies where in Africa at what frequency and with what aircraft. Then they market and sell the flights. The Lufthansa Group carriers operate the flights.

jubaexpress wrote:

They serve JFK and YYZ year-round, unless I am mistaken. These are not insubstantial backwaters. Both large, international cities in their own right and with a large diaspora, and if necessary offer connections.

I don't think it's quite right to say they are an Africa - Europe airline, though it's part of it.

They are predominantly and unquestionably an intra-Europe airline with a sizable legacy African network that they are desperately trying to hold on to. But even in Africa they are being passed by TP who will have (and probably already has) more daily departures.
After next January they will:
- serve zero destinations in the largest air market in the world: Asia
- serve only 2 cities in the 2nd largest air market in the World: N.America.
- They will serve zero destinations in S.America

blueflyer wrote:

They're in a revenue-sharing joint venture with Air Canada and United. For all intent and purposes, they have non-stop flights between BRU and EWR, JFK, YUL, YYZ, IAD, and ORD. It may not be their metal, but they market and sell the flights and retain the revenues. Brussels Airlines has an extensive presence, brand recognition, and much less competition on the African continent so they find it more profitable to focus their marketing efforts on traffic from Africa to North America, than to focus on North American customers.

Good point. I had forgotten about the A++ JV. They should move the aircraft coming out of BOM, to MIA based on the stats in reply #12.

airbazar wrote:

jubaexpress wrote:

They serve JFK and YYZ year-round, unless I am mistaken. These are not insubstantial backwaters. Both large, international cities in their own right and with a large diaspora, and if necessary offer connections.

I don't think it's quite right to say they are an Africa - Europe airline, though it's part of it.

They are predominantly and unquestionably an intra-Europe airline with a sizable legacy African network that they are desperately trying to hold on to. But even in Africa they are being passed by TP who will have (and probably already has) more daily departures.
After next January they will:
- serve zero destinations in the largest air market in the world: Asia
- serve only 2 cities in the 2nd largest air market in the World: N.America.
- They will serve zero destinations in S.America

blueflyer wrote:

They're in a revenue-sharing joint venture with Air Canada and United. For all intent and purposes, they have non-stop flights between BRU and EWR, JFK, YUL, YYZ, IAD, and ORD. It may not be their metal, but they market and sell the flights and retain the revenues. Brussels Airlines has an extensive presence, brand recognition, and much less competition on the African continent so they find it more profitable to focus their marketing efforts on traffic from Africa to North America, than to focus on North American customers.

Good point. I had forgotten about the A++ JV. They should move the aircraft coming out of BOM, to MIA based on the stats in reply #12.

It's quite clear we are talking about SN in terms of long haul, not their short haul arm, so calling it intra-Europe is a bit redundant.

TAP might offer more daily departures, but on a short-haul jet without proper business class, so not an entirely fair competition.

I'm fairly sure they don't care about Asia, they know Africa which has high value traffic, as well as increasingly back of the bus traffic able and willing to travel.

LH aren't going to get rid of the SN brand right now given its strength on the continent and connections through Brussels on SN metal and through JV.

I've travelled extensively in Africa - the SN brand is strong and in ports with little other (reliable) competition.

jubaexpress wrote:

It's quite clear we are talking about SN in terms of long haul, not their short haul arm, so calling it intra-Europe is a bit redundant.

I think the discussion evolved into what might be SN's future and it's worth pointing out that even with their well known African network, that is only 1 million passengers compared to the 9+ million overall passengers that the airline transports per year. On top of that 65% of all SN African passengers connect at BRU, meaning that they are exposed to increased competition from other airlines such as ET, TP, AF, and TK and even the LCC's.
So while I agree with nearly everything that you said, their future doesn't seem very clear or stable IMO.

Sad to see another EU link go from BOM. They gave it a good try and those O&D numbers are surprisingly high. That said, I bet the increase of O&D on BOM-BRU from 40k to 60k was probably due to this SN flight offering cheap fares, and people started their EU trips in BRU instead of AMS or somewhere else. Flights from India are tough when there really isn't a strong O&D J class need or a massive connecting network in NA. Just having JFK in the winter is just not enough. Btw winter is probably more peak for India flights than summer. So losing IAD and YYZ in the winter didn't help. Maybe an Indian carrier will start the route one day (not now for sure) capturing India demand to BRU in the summer and BRU demand to winter sun in India & Asia along with the O&D.

airbazar wrote:

jubaexpress wrote:

It's quite clear we are talking about SN in terms of long haul, not their short haul arm, so calling it intra-Europe is a bit redundant.

I think the discussion evolved into what might be SN's future and it's worth pointing out that even with their well known African network, that is only 1 million passengers compared to the 9+ million overall passengers that the airline transports per year. On top of that 65% of all SN African passengers connect at BRU, meaning that they are exposed to increased competition from other airlines such as ET, TP, AF, and TK and even the LCC's.
So while I agree with nearly everything that you said, their future doesn't seem very clear or stable IMO.

Their EU brand may be under threat and replaced with Eurowings or similar. However, I would argue that LH cannot afford to pull the plug on SN in Africa. ET, with whom they are rumoured to be exploring a JV with, do not have the same brand reputation, and for many it's a long dog-leg out the way.
Would be interesting to see the yield on those 1m passengers, though. A connection to NA, for example, with SN is two long haul flights with a connection in a very pleasant airport. With ET it's an often ropey 737 or DH8 or an even worse 767 followed by a nice long-haul plane. However, the experience can be a bit hit or miss.

TK is not a true competitor on most routes given the utterly rubbish flight times from many ports. It's stupid o'clock from Entebbe, no thanks.

jubaexpress wrote:

Would be interesting to see the yield on those 1m passengers, though.
[...]
TK is not a true competitor on most routes given the utterly rubbish flight times from many ports. It's stupid o'clock from Entebbe, no thanks.

Yields, that's what really matters isn't it? But here's the problem. For far too long SN and AF have had the market all to themselves. With additional competition comes downward pressure on yields. Those A330's aren't cheap to operate compared with 2x A320/737's. That's where the likes of TK has an advantage.
As for TK's schedule, that will all change when the new IST airport opens. The floodgates of cheap fares between Europe and Africa via IST with great connections, will open and that will put huge pressure on the 65% of SN's African passengers. I was actually shocked to find out that the connecting percentage is that high.

airbazar wrote:

jubaexpress wrote:

Would be interesting to see the yield on those 1m passengers, though.
[...]
TK is not a true competitor on most routes given the utterly rubbish flight times from many ports. It's stupid o'clock from Entebbe, no thanks.

Yields, that's what really matters isn't it? But here's the problem. For far too long SN and AF have had the market all to themselves. With additional competition comes downward pressure on yields. Those A330's aren't cheap to operate compared with 2x A320/737's. That's where the likes of TK has an advantage.
As for TK's schedule, that will all change when the new IST airport opens. The floodgates of cheap fares between Europe and Africa via IST with great connections, will open and that will put huge pressure on the 65% of SN's African passengers. I was actually shocked to find out that the connecting percentage is that high.

The new IST will put pressure on many airlines. It is much easier to fill a narrowbody than widebody. I expect they will be tough competition.

Lightsaber

lightsaber wrote:

The new IST will put pressure on many airlines. It is much easier to fill a narrowbody than widebody. I expect they will be tough competition.

Indeed they will and yes it's much easier to fill a narrowbody which is why SN's routes are usually tags, triangles, and infrequent. They don't fly A330's because they want to. They fly them because they have to. Their central African destinations in particular will be under tremendous pressure. These reasons (NB capability and TK's future threat), i believe is why TP is expanding in West Africa instead of venturing East.

Truly hope the stay in YYZ. Wonderful airline. I had an Indian FA on board the flight from BRU-YYZ. And two Indian pax in close proximity to me, one being my neighbour. Poor guy did not have his special meal on board and survived on crackers (his own). However like me (Khi) they were probably connecting pax from the Etihad flight to Brussels and not original SN from Mumbai.

If they pulled out what chance would WOW air have to Delhi?