Flights to Australia

Cathay Pacific will increase the frequency of flights to Australia and sees opportunities for more partnerships with Qantas, according to Cathay Pacific's chief executive Tony Tyler.We’ve got a great network around Australia. We don’t see many opportunities for adding new points to that network, but we do see opportunities to add frequency, he told Business Spectator in an exclusive interview.

On potential partnerships with Australia's national carrier, Mr Tyler explained that there is more opportunity for tie ups.They work with someone else to Paris. I’d love to see them work with us instead, he said.And I’m sure there’ll be other opportunities to do that. And we compete like hell on the Australia/Hong Kong sectors and that’s as it should be. We don’t have any antitrust immunity. We’ve never asked for it. We believe we make a very good job of serving the market between us and it’s very competitive and no quarter is given nor expected but beyond Hong Kong there are opportunities to cooperate.

And of course within Australia we feed Qantas. The One World arrangements we have give us very good access to their network within Australia and so we can feed them on the domestic sectors, the Cathay Pacific chief said.Mr Tyler also praised Qantas' dual brand no frills strategy.
On the wider sector, Mr Tyler spoke about the opportunity for international carriers to take stakes in Chinese airlines and said that while the sector is recovering, if there is a double dip, all bets are off.