Scoot gears up for growth amid COVID woes

Scoot, the low-cost arm of Singapore Airlines Group, said it has upgraded its services and health and safety measures during the downturn of global air travel market since the COVID-19 pandemic began, and is confident in the future growth potential of its business, especially in Asia.

So far, it has resumed flights for more than one-third of its total routes, reaching 12 countries and 26 destinations. Before the pandemic, its network expanded to 68 destinations across 15 countries, it said.

In the Chinese mainland, the budget carrier currently operates once-a-week round-trip flights that connect Singapore with Tianjin, Guangzhou, Guangdong province, Nanjing, Jiangsu province, Zhengzhou, Henan province, and Wuhan, Hubei province. Those five routes between Singapore and the Chinese mainland resumed flying between June and December last year.

In addition, Scoot also resumed flights between Singapore and Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan. Most flights of Scoot are under code share agreements with Singapore Airlines.

“For flights that are operating between Singapore and China, the passenger occupancy loads are fairly high, and most passengers are business travelers and students, despite the dropping number of leisure travelers. We hope to resume more flights between the two countries, and it depends on the decision of regulators,” said Bernard Sim, deputy general manager for Scoot China.

“In May, we took delivery of our first A321neo aircraft. We plan to use more A321neo aircraft to transport passengers between Singapore and China in the future,” said Sim, who is responsible for sales, operations and business development in the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong and Macao.

Scoot said it has another 13 A321neo aircraft on order and is expected to take delivery of them before 2024. The A321neo is one of the latest single-aisle aircraft model of Airbus and has about 50 more seats than the A320neo.

Scoot took to the skies in June 2012 and merged with Tigerair Singapore in 2017, retaining the Scoot brand. Now, it has a fleet of 20 wide-body Boeing B787 and 29 single-aisle Airbus A320 family aircraft. The average age of its fleet is less than six years old.

On another front, the global spread of the contagion has led to rising demand for air cargo flights. Global airlines are trying to stay afloat by maximizing cargo freight transport operations using commercial aircraft.

In the wake of the pandemic, Scoot started to operate cargo charters using B787 and A320 aircraft since March last year. The first cargo flight, which took off from Nanjing to Singapore was operated by a B787-9 aircraft. It transported goods with bellyhold cargo capacities. Later, Scoot renovated the cabins of some of its commercial aircraft to transport goods.

So far, Scoot has operated more than 600 cargo charters, mainly on Australia and China routes. For China, Scoot has transported goods to destinations such as Guangzhou, Nanjing, Wuhan, Qingdao in Shandong province, and Hangzhou in Zhejiang province.

Last year, airfreight was the bright spot in air transportation, as the market adapted to keep goods moving, including vaccines, personal protective equipment and vital medical supplies, despite the massive drop in capacity from passenger aircraft, the International Air Transport Association said in a new report released this week.

In 2020, 1.8 billion passengers took flights globally, a decline of 60.2 percent compared to 4.5 billion people who flew in 2019. The decline in air passengers transported last year was the largest recorded since the 1950s. Total industry passenger revenues fell by 69 percent to $189 billion in 2020, and net losses were $126.4 billion in total, the worst on record, IATA said.

“Many governments recognized aviation’s critical contributions and provided financial lifelines and other forms of support. But it was the rapid action by airlines and the commitment of our people that saw the airline industry through the most difficult year in its history,” said Willie Walsh, IATA’s director general.

For flights that are operating between Singapore and China, the passenger occupancy loads are fairly high, and most passengers are business travelers and students, despite the dropping number of leisure travelers.”

Bernard Sim, deputy general manager of Scoot China

PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY A Scoot employee (right) helps passengers check luggage at Singapore Changi Airport in September.