easyJet has announced Emirates is set to become a new airline partner to its unique connections service, Worldwide by easyJet.
The deal is expected to be live in the coming months.
From then easyJet customers will be able to seamlessly connect between easyJet flights across its European network flying into London Gatwick Airport and onwards on Emirates flights, initially between London Gatwick and Dubai, but with plans to extend to more gateways and destinations.
Worldwide by easyJet has been consistently growing, with more than 5,000 unique origins and destinations which have been booked in combination with partner airlines.
Johan Lundgren, easyJet chief executive, said: “We will be really pleased to welcome Emirates as an easyJet Worldwide partner airline.
“Given we both serve many popular destinations from London Gatwick, we are confident their addition to Worldwide will be very popular with our customers who are looking for an easy and seamless way to connect between Europe, the Middle East and beyond.”
He added: “We have been delighted with the appetite of partner airlines to expand Worldwide across our network and continue to broaden our focus to offer this unique connecting service at more of our biggest airports.
“Tens of millions of connecting passengers travel each year with journeys which begin or end in Europe.”
The addition compliments easyJet’s existing relationships with Virgin Atlantic, Norwegian, WestJet and Singapore Airlines and its low-cost subsidiary Scoot, which joined in September.
Thierry Antinori, Emirates executive vice president, said: “The Emirates proposition has always been about providing customers with a better flying experience both in the air and on the ground.
“We offer our customers an extensive choice of flight options not only through our own global network, but also through our partner airlines.
“We are delighted to join easyJet’s Worldwide programme, which enables us to jointly offer travellers a seamless connection experience when they fly on Emirates and easyJet combined itineraries via London Gatwick, one of our main UK gateways.”