The EasyJet Boost! New Routes, Aircraft and Staff to Portugal
Easyjet
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Portugal is on the rise! Now that may seem like an odd thing to say given all the economic doom and gloom that seems to be surrounding Europe at the moment. But if you talk to the folks at EasyJet, then you will see that they certainly believe that Portugal is set to do well in the coming years as they have just announced that they will be boosting the company's operations in Portugal with new investment.
This investment in pure monetary terms is worth about €38 million and includes the company hiring thirty-eight new members of staff who will be based at Lisbon Airport, and a new airplane, which will increase the number that the company has in Portugal by 50% (to three).
To accompany this new money and new employees, the company has also announced that they will be opening up two new routes in Portugal.
This is clearly not only good news as far as the extra ease of access that people will now have on moving into Portugal, but is also good news on a wider level, because it is a vote of confidence for the tourist industry in Portugal and is a clear judgment on the part of EasyJets management that they feel that Portugal is on an upward trend.
Of course in the short term the whole of Europe is caught up in something of a financial malaise and so there may well be a few speed bumps ahead. But it is good to know that real businesses who operate in a global economy are choosing to invest in their operations in Portugal right now, because they clearly believe that over the mid to long term it will a good investment.
The General Manager for EasyJet's operation in Spain and Portugal, Javier Gandara, spoke very favorably about the results that had been obtained on the Portuguese routes, and that because of those favorable results that the company had decided that now was a good time to invest in the area.
The number of passengers who have passed through Portugal on an EasyJet Flight is expected to exceed two million through to the end of 2012, and so the investment was very much driven by both expected and future demand.
The new routes that EasyJet plans on opening up with this new plane are from Lisbon to Valencia, and Lisbon to Bilbao, with three and four weekly flights respectively.
There has been close attention paid by the company to future development plans at Lisbon Airport, particularly in regard to the likely departure terminals for the new flights. It is expected that in the short term the new flights will depart from Terminal 1, but with new upgrades and development expected at Terminal 2, the long term expectation is that the company expects the bulk of their flights to depart from Terminal 2.
There are also other potential routes out to the Azores that are currently under discussion. But to a large extent whether or not EasyJet decides to finance these routes will ultimately be dependent on whether or not the Government of the Azores decides to free up the travel routes to the region and allow greater levels of competition.
There is however precedence for this because the Madeira Government did something very similar when they freed up their air routes in the past.
Javier Gandara had this to say on the matter:
“After a new government has been formed in the Azores we will resume negotiations with the national and regional Governments to do something like what was done in Madeira. All you have to do is look at what happened with Madeiran airspace, in which the increase of competition resulted in fares being dropped by an average of 30 percent."
A drop of 30% in the prices of airfares to the Azores would indeed be good news for consumers! But it remains to be seen how this plays out, as there are still a large number of legislative and practical hurdles to be overcome before it will happen.
For the moment though the new investment in Portugal by EasyJet is too be warmly welcomed.
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Published in: Business / Guide to Portugal / Travel