Starlux Aims to be ‘Emirates of Taiwan’
Starlux was born out of retaliation when chief executive officer Chang Kuo-Wei was ousted from Taiwan’s EVA Air by his half-siblings after the death of their father.
Taiwan’s new airline Starlux is officially in the sky. The highly-anticipated airline commenced operations this week with the first flight from Taipei to Macau on January 23, 2020.
The airline chose to launch this week due to strong demand for travel around the Chinese New Year.
The airline has launched operations with a fleet of A321neo aircraft which feature 188 seats including eight business class seats which lie completely flat.
Starlux will operate the route to Macau 106 times a week.
The other launch routes are to Da Nang in Vietnam and Penang in Malaysia will be flown 36 and 14 times a week respectively.
The airline is planning on launching another route to Cebu in the Philippines in coming months.
Starlux history
Starlux was born out of retaliation when chief executive officer Chang Kuo-Wei was ousted from Taiwan’s EVA Air by his half-siblings after the death of their father.
Mr Chang vowed to set up a rival airline.
So Starlux was created and the aviation world held its breath to watch the drama unfold. And now, here we are, waiting to see if the airline will be a success.
The personal reasons behind the airline’s origins can be seen in how much care the CEO is taking in setting up his airline.
Mr Chang has sworn to inspect and fly every aircraft used by the airline.
His level of care is touching, if potentially impractical.
The airline is expecting to receive 17 A350s over the coming years which, if Mr Chang wants to fly each one of them, will mean the CEO will be in the sky a lot.
The airline has plans to be the “Emirates of Taiwan” with a strong focus on luxury.
In a statement announcing the creation of the airline, Mr Chang said: “I want to bring Taiwanese airline brands to the world stage, breaking the stereotypes that we don’t have quality carriers.”
But this will be the first time Taiwan has a new airline in over 30 years, so it has a lot to prove.