THAI Smile appears to be ushering in a new era with its market positioning and growth strategy better defined and executed.
The wholly owned subsidiary of flag carrier Thai Airways International (THAI) has now ascertained it will become a premium full-service carrier, boosting its regional footprint in a bid to become one of Asia's leading airlines over the next five years.
The low-profile THAI Smile is ending its confusing past status, once as a budget airline and then as a "light premium" carrier to be a fully-fledged legacy airline in the same league as Singapore's SilkAir and Cathay Dragon, previously Dragonair, of Hong Kong.
THAI Smile's acting chief executive, Woranate Laprabang, made clear yesterday that the airline's new positioning is seen an essential step to show where it stands in the marketplace and what direction it will head in.
Capt Woranate spoke about several undertakings being carried out to gain the new status and promoting flight integration with its parent.
A more subtle colour scheme for its logo, extensive upgrading of passenger services and offerings including opening airport lounges are some of the elements which will enable it to migrate into the "premium" league, departing from the low-cost carrier business model it got lost in for quite some time.
Woranate: Clarifying new positioning
THAI Smile is accelerating a strategy to assume most international routes in the region as well as domestic routes from THAI, which will basically concentrate on medium and long-haul international services.
This year will see THAI Smile boosting its international footprint with flights within a four-and-a-half-hour radius of Bangkok.
Plans are afoot for THAI Smile to put more than 10 international routes on its roster this year in an expansion that highlights India, China and Asean, where it seeks to cash in on growing travel demand.
THAI Smile's international network expansion conforms with its own route plan and supports THAI's "Asean Connect" initiative to better link the Kingdom with fellow states in Southeast Asia, Capt Woranate said.
This year's expedited international drive will kick-off with the launch of a new daily service from Bangkok to Zhengzhou, China, on Jan 27.
It will be followed on March 1 by a new daily service from Bangkok to Kota Kinabalu, capital of Malaysia's Sabah state.
With the commencement of a new northern summer flight programme on March 26, THAI Smile will launch services from Bangkok to Yangon, Vientiane and Phnom Penh to supplement services being operated by THAI.
At the same time, THAI Smile will take over the flights from Bangkok to Xiamen and Kunming, which are operated by THAI to better match travel demand on these two Chinese routes.
THAI Smile is also considering regular flights from Bangkok to Cebu in the Philippines, according to Capt Woranate.
Last year, THAI Smile launched six international routes including Changsha and Chongqing in China, and Gaya Varanasi, Jaipur and Lucknow, all in India.
THAI Smile's current network includes 10 domestic and 11 international routes.
The increased international coverage will result in the ratio between domestic and international transformed to 55:45 this year, compared to 80:20 last year.
The airline targets to grow its revenue this year to 10.1 billion baht, up from an estimated 7 billion for last year and 4.5 billion in 2015.
THAI Smile aims to carry 4.5 million passengers this year, up from 3.2 million last year, improving its load factor to 78% in 2017 from 73.5% last year.
Among the major investments in THAI Smile's brand lifting exercise is the debut of a 130-million-baht in-flight entertainment system (IES) that allows passengers to access movies, music, news, magazines and games on their personal electronic devices free of charge.
There is no IES in the THAI Smile cabins, which come largely in budget airline configuration.
THAI Smile expects to make the IES available on its fleet of 20 A320-200 narrow-body jets in May.
Another major scheme to gain "premium'' status is the opening of more airport lounges in the country.
THAI Smile already opened two such lounges last year, in Khon Kaen and Ubon Ratchatani, and is on course to open seven more this year.