Page 49 - GEORptSep19

9.2 Major corporate news 9.2.1 Transport corporate news
Budget airline Ryanair has announced o n August 21 that it will be starting routes to Western Europe from two airports in Georgia, Tbilisi and Kutaisi. The move is likely to help the country get more traction as a tourist destination among European customers, after Russia enforced a soft ban by prohibiting direct flights in July following tense diplomatic relations.
To celebrate the launch of its first Georgian airports, Ryanair has begun a seat sale, with fares from just €9.99, for travel in November and December, which must be booked by midnight Friday (23 August) only on the Ryanair.com website.
From November, the airline will operate flights from Tbilisi to Milan Bergamo in Italy, and from Kutaisi to Marseille in France and Bologna in Italy. Ryanair will also connect Tbilisi to Cologne in April as part of Ryanair’s Summer 2020 schedule.
“These four new routes[...] will further promote Georgian tourism and will deliver over 170,000 customers annually to/from two European countries to one of Europe’s fastest-growing tourism destinations,” Ryanair chief commercial officer David O’Brien said. “We look forward to developing new Georgian traffic growth, new routes and jobs in the coming years.
On June 25 the Hungarian budget airline Wizz Air also announced 12 new routes from its Georgian hub, Kutaisi.
The new flights will serve Turku (Finland), Nice (France), Baden-Baden, Hamburg, Frankfurt and Nuremberg (Germany), Heraklion (Greece), Naples, Pisa and Venice (Italy), Poznan (Poland) and Stockholm (Sweden).
Seven out of the twelve new routes (Baden-Baden, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Naples, Pisa, Poznan and Venice) will be launched by the end of 2019. The others will be operational from the summer of 2020.
Following up on announced flights for Tallinn, Bar, Copenhagen, Eindhoven, Basel and Brussels, Wizz Air has said it will also launch direct flights from Georgia’s Kutaisi International Airport to 10 more European cities including Hamburg, Nice, Frankfurt, Venice and Heraklion, Business Press News reported airport officials as saying.
The new destinations will be added gradually by the summer of 2020.
Wizz Air planned to launch flights to six new destinations from Kutaisi in August. However, due to operational problems, the launches were delayed until September 10. According to Kutaisi International Airport, regular flights to Eindhoven (Netherlands), Tallinn (Estonia), Brussels (Belgium), Copenhagen (Denmark), Bar (Italy) and Basel (Switzerland) will be operated several times a week.
Also by the summer of 2020, direct flights will be launched to European cities including Naples, Pisa and Venice.
Wizz Air started operating from Kutaisi International Airport in 2012. After the new flights are launched in September, the airline will offer flights from Kutaisi to 27cities in 18 countries.
In June 2019, Kutaisi Airport served 77,003 passengers, an increase of 21% compared to the same period of last year.
In the whole January-June period, there were 364,834 passengers landing at or departing from Kutaisi, 55.4% up year on year. In the first six months of 2019, Georgia's airports served a total of 2,489,823 passengers.
49 GEORGIA Country Report September 2019 www.intellinews.com