Summary airBaltic won't join an alliance to protect its partnerships. Existing codeshare partners contribute 12% of the airline's revenue. Changing alliances, like SAS, impacts connectivity & loyalty programs.
airBaltic has no plans to seek membership of an airline alliance. During the recent Farnborough Airshow, the airline’s CEO, Martin Gauss, explained why to Simple Flying during a sideline interview. Most of the world’s major airlines are a member of one of the big three airline alliances.
These are oneworld , SkyTeam , and Star Alliance . Membership of these “clubs” can be seen as a status symbol and can unlock additional partnerships for an airline. However, some airlines aren’t so interested in joining an alliance, as Gauss explained.
Alliance membership would kill partnerships Explaining his reasons for not wanting to join an alliance, Gauss clarified that such a decision could kill off many of the airBaltic's current partnerships, “As the Baltics are not served by the other [carriers] to the extent we do we believe its better to stay our of an alliance.” “We have 24 codeshare partners today. They deliver around 12% of our total revenues which is a significant number.
If we go into an alliance that would change as we are working with [airlines from] all alliances, and all of them benefit from airBaltic being the one which serves the Baltics.” Gauss expanded, commenting, “Today we offer a connectivity for the Baltics with more than 300 megacities around the world with one stop. If I now go into one alliance we would change that connectivity to the Baltics by focusing on the connectivity that alliance has.
” airBaltic’s Alliance Partners According to schedule data from Cirium , airBaltic currently has the following partners from each of the major alliances in August 2024 (the total number of airlines per alliance is shown at the bottom of the table), one world SkyTeam Star Alliance Not Aligned British Airways Air France Aegean Airlines Air Serbia Iberia Czech Airlines Austrian Airlines Azerbaijan Airlines Delta Air Lines Brussels Airlines Bulgaria Air ITA Airways LOT Polish Airlines Emirates KLM Lufthansa Icelandair Tarom SAS KM Malta Airlines SWISS Uzbekistan Airlines TAP Air Portugal Turkish Airlines 2 6 9 7 All change at SAS To see the impact of changing alliances, one only has to look at what is currently happening at SAS. After being financially rescued by Air France-KLM, the Scandinavian carrier is leaving Star Alliance at the end of the month to join SkyTeam. According to Cirium data, SAS will end codeshares with Air Canada, Austrian Airlines, Croatia Airlines, Lufthansa, SWISS, and Turkish Airlines at the end of the month.
New codeshares will then start with Air France and KLM. A move to SkyTeam will be good news for some, irrelevant for others, but also bad news for a portion of travelers. The swap in alliance will not just affect connectivity for passengers though.
It will also mean a change in benefits for passengers with its loyalty program moving to align with SkyTeam. Moving to an alliance would also mean a new alignment for airBaltic’s frequent flyers..
