Lion plans on making 'island near Singapore' a major hub

[MAN Flyer]

Unfortunately it is not a new airport on Sentosa....

Lion Group has decided to make Batam, an island in Indonesia with very close proximity to Singapore, as its second major hub after Jakarta.

The group in recent months has increased the number of domestic destinations it serves from Batam to 15 and aims to eventually serve 20 domestic destinations in Indonesia from Batam.

Lion Air will, for example, be launching a daily non-stop service on 29 January from Batam to Pontianak using Boeing 737-800s and has plans to launch a Batam-Makassar and Batam-Bali Denpasar service.

“Batam is ideally located for people wishing to travel between eastern and western Indonesia,” said Lion Group president director, Rusdi Kirana. “The distance is actually shorter if you transit in Batam rather than flying further south to Jakarta to transit. This is a ‘win-win’ for consumers and for the airline. The shorter flying time makes flying more convenient for passengers and it means aircraft burn less fuel, leading to significant cost savings.”

International passengers will benefit too, because next year Lion Group plans to launch international services from Batam.

Overseas destinations it aims to serve from Batam include points in southern China such as Guangzhou and Hong Kong. It also plans to serve Bangkok (Thailand) and Jeddah (Saudi Arabia) from Batam, as well as destinations in India, such as New Delhi and Mumbai. The flying distance from Batam to Northeast Asia and India is shorter than Jakarta.

[lingua101]

If he can make some tie up with ferry company and negotiate with Indonesian government for seamless connection like in HKG/MFM may be a good alternative for people in Singapore

[yflyer]

Lion Air in the news again...

http://www.pprune.org/south-asia-far...il-strike.html

[kapitan]

Singapore is lucky to have some not so smart neighbours.... what is so difficult for the islands in the south to build an efficient port, ships will still have to sail through the Straits, and if they have a cheaper more efficient port in the south, our hub port status would be a failure.... the neighbours up North built a port on the west coast very near to us, and it is huge too,.... however, due to lack of services and inefficiency and some clever poltiking by some agencies here, that port up in the north is not doing very well and we are able to maintain hub port status....

you think the hub airport in the south will work??

[scooby5]

If he can make some tie up with ferry company and negotiate with Indonesian government for seamless connection like in HKG/MFM may be a good alternative for people in Singapore

I think you have it about face...... ferries run passengers between HKG and Macau, not between Hong Kong and MFM.

Nobody specifically travels from HK to fly from Macau just the same as nobody (except the very cheap) would get on a ferry out of SG to fly from Batam.

[CarbonMan]

I think you have it about face...... ferries run passengers between HKG and Macau, not between Hong Kong and MFM.

Nobody specifically travels from HK to fly from Macau just the same as nobody (except the very cheap) would get on a ferry out of SG to fly from Batam.

Having said that, AirAsia was doing quite well bussing budget conscious pax to JHB, to the point that Singapore was throwing up all sorts of rules to stop it. Eg. the cost for JHB-BKI and SIN-BKI return are MYR191 and S$181 respectively.

If the authorities in Batam have the desire and the wherewithal, they could potentially steal some traffic from SIN. Agree that it won't be an outright threat in the near term but it could dent SIN's growth for Indonesian destinations.

It's an issue of when the arbitrage is significant enough to endure a boat trip to Batam. All-in-all, competition and choice is a good thing.

[scooby5]

It's funny, I had the JHB bus transfer in my head as I was replying because I did it a couple of times to come to Singapore when living in KL. In the end I only did it a few times before going back to the efficiency of driving in instead.

It is indeed what can be endured.

[lingua101]

Singapore is lucky to have some not so smart neighbours.... what is so difficult for the islands in the south to build an efficient port, ships will still have to sail through the Straits, and if they have a cheaper more efficient port in the south, our hub port status would be a failure.... the neighbours up North built a port on the west coast very near to us, and it is huge too,.... however, due to lack of services and inefficiency and some clever poltiking by some agencies here, that port up in the north is not doing very well and we are able to maintain hub port status....

you think the hub airport in the south will work??

well... Singapore is Singapore today because Singapore (I am referring specificly to a specific person) knows and realizes that it has not so smart neighbour in the north and south. but at the same times, also cannot offend them....

you see how much SQ has benefited from ex-CGK traffic because of the ineffiency of GA and build a very strong brand in Indonesia. So even know GA has some how catch up, there are segment of the Indonesian market is still prefer SQ over GA.

[lingua101]

I think you have it about face...... ferries run passengers between HKG and Macau, not between Hong Kong and MFM.

Nobody specifically travels from HK to fly from Macau just the same as nobody (except the very cheap) would get on a ferry out of SG to fly from Batam.

I am using the airport code quite losely to indicate the city.

Well, it depends on what Lion has in the plane? of course, you will probably not to fly between SIN and CGK via BTH.


But if you want to fly to any secondary cities in Indonesia, which is not served from SIN or not so frequent, BTH may be a good choice.

Again it is all about the business model.

If they can make it a quite attractive offer that over come the hassle to take a ferry to Batam, I am very sure there will be a segment of Singapore market that will be lure away.

But looking at the news, it seems the plan is more to cater for Indonesian domestic market, which is huge compare to Singapore market, and avoiding the congested CGK.

Personally, I do not think there will be much traffic from SIN unless Lion Air can really work with Batam government and do the infrastructure overhaul.

[Kyo]

From what I'm told, the head honcho at Batam ferry arrivals immigration runs it mafia style. Does whatever he wants, and treats pax like dirt. I have no intention to give this place a try anytime soon, as a result.

[MSPeconomist]

Since this is the "Sea Lion" airline (reference to crash landing in shallow water), it's reassuring that they're choosing an airport with beaches nearby.

[lingua101]

From what I'm told, the head honcho at Batam ferry arrivals immigration runs it mafia style. Does whatever he wants, and treats pax like dirt. I have no intention to give this place a try anytime soon, as a result.

I guess not only that, almost everything in that island is run by mafia or mafia style.