Laudamotion and Ryanair have announced details of the Laudamotion summer 2018 schedule – with a total of 21 aircraft operating from nine cities in Austria and Germany from June.
Last week, Laudamotion and
Ryanair announced a new aviation partnership where the Irish airline is initially taking a 24.9 per cent stake in the Austrian carrier, which will increase to 75 per cent subject to approval by the EU Competition Authority.
The aim is to further develop and expand Laudamotion, headquartered in Vienna.
Niki Lauda will chair the newly created Laudamotion board and be responsible in his new role for establishing Laudamotion as an Austrian low-fare airline for the scheduled and charter market.
This agreement with Ryanair will allow the gradual growth of Laudamotion in Austria which currently has a fleet of ten Airbus aircraft.
Ryanair will provide financial and management support to Laudamotion as well as six wet-lease aircraft for summer to enable Laudamotion to complete an extensive 21 aircraft flying programme from June.
Four aircraft will be based in Vienna and the frequency of flights to Palma de Mallorca will increase to up to three daily connections.
Four Laudamotion aircraft will be based in Berlin Tegel, six in Dusseldorf, one each in Cologne, Frankfurt, Munich, Nuremberg and Stuttgart respectively, with two in Zurich.
Laudamotion’s new Berlin Tegel base will open on June 1st with four based aircraft, offering low fare routes to 17 sunshine destinations: Barcelona, Brindisi, Corfu, Faro, Fuerteventura, Heraklion, Ibiza, Kos, Lanzarote, Las Palmas, Malaga, Milan Malpensa, Palma de Mallorca, Pula, Rhodes, Rijeka and Tenerife.
This coming winter, Laudamotion will focus on a city shuttle service with up to three more aircraft based in Vienna, allowing Austrian customers to benefit from a wider selection of flights at affordable prices to Europe’s major cities.
The inaugural Laudamotion flight from Dusseldorf to Palma de Mallorca took off last Sunday in record time – just 25 days after the takeover from NIKI on March 1st.
The Spanish sunshine isle is one of the most important destinations in the Laudamotion route network.
All of the most popular tourist destinations will be served by Laudamotion from Austria, Germany and Switzerland.
In Vienna, Niki Lauda, Laudamotion chairman, said: “I am pleased to confirm that Laudamotion is now up and running and I would like to thank the Laudamotion team for all their hard work and enthusiasm, which has allowed us to start efficiently and on time.
“We look forward to building the Laudamotion brand and to creating new jobs, more promotional opportunities and greater consumer choice, particularly in Vienna where we will more than double our Airbus aircraft base next year.”