Japan's ANA airline group has become a new member of what has been billed as the world's largest low-cost carrier (LCC) alliance.
The inclusion of ANA's full-service airline and its budget carrier subsidiary Vanilla Air into the Value Alliance (VA) was made possible after parent ANA Holdings Inc took a 15% stake in Air Black Box Asia Pacific Pte Ltd.
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Air Black Box Asia Pacific, a joint venture founded by Singapore's long-haul low-cost carrier Scoot, Thailand's Nok Air and VaultPAD Ventures Ltd, provides cloud-based airline passenger software platforms, which are instrumental to VA's move to connect diverse member airlines and cooperate in business.
The entry of ANA Holdings into VA strengthens the alliance's footprint. It also represents the first time VA has embraced a full-service airline, as the group had previously consisted entirely of no-frills operators.
ANA Holdings' admission to alliance also comes as Philippines-based budget airline group Cebu Air Inc acquired a 15% stake in the joint venture, according to Nok Air executives.
Together with ANA group, VA now includes Scoot, Nok Air, NokScoot, Tigerair Singapore, Tigerair Australia, Cebu Pacific, Cebgo, Jeju Air, Vanilla Air and ANA.
Their footprints now extend to over 250 destinations, up from 160 provided by the original eight VA members.
There has been a change in the shareholding ratio of Air Black Box Asia Pacific to accommodate the acquisition by ANA Holdings and Cebu Air. Nok Air and Scoot each reduced their stakes from 25% to 15%, while VaultPAD Ventures trimmed its stake from 50% 5o 40%.
The joint venture's chairman William Liu said the company will continue expanding its footprint as its VA airline customers adopt Air Black Box technology.
The company expects to have more airline customers in Asia-Pacific in the near future.
Through the system, customers will be able to view, select and book the best available fares on flights from any VA member airlines in a single transaction with a single payment, directly from partners' websites.