SWISS wants to reduce reliance on third-party airlines
Keystone
Swiss International Airlines’ new Chief Commercial Officer Heike Birlenbach wants to reduce the number of leased flights from Helvetic Airways and Air Baltic.
This content was published on
2 minutes
Keystone-SDA
This practice, referred to in technical jargon as ‘wet leasing’, currently accounts for around a third of SWISS summer flights in Europe.
“We currently have a large number of wet lease aircraft in service,” said the 57-year-old German executive this week at a press meeting at SWISS headquarters in Kloten.
The reason for this recourse to other airlines is due to engine problems of the manufacturer Pratt & Whitney. In practice, because of this glitch, some Swiss aircraft cannot be operated as planned, explained Birlenbach.
“Without wet lease we would be forced to cut several continental routes. This would also have consequences for intercontinental traffic,” said Birlenbach who joined at the beginning of the year. Network stability and quality remain top priority for Swiss, she emphasised.
Among customers Helvetic Airways and Air Baltic are perceived only slightly worse than SWISS. The degree of satisfaction reaches 72%, compared to 76% for the former national airline.
The long-term aim, however, is to reduce dependence on wet leasing, even if it will be impossible to give it up completely. The practice in fact makes it possible to compensate for seasonal differences: ‘In summer and winter we have very different demands,” emphasised Birlenbach.
“In the future we could probably only have one wet lease partner,” and this could happen from 2026, provided that Pratt & Whitney’s problems are resolved. “Helvetic will also remain a strategic partner in the future,” Birlenbach continued, but “by this I do not mean that Air Baltic will be out.”
Adapted from Italian by DeepL/ac
This news story has been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team. At SWI swissinfo.ch we select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate it into English. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles.
If you want to know more about how we work, have a look here, and if you have feedback on this news story please write to english@swissinfo.ch.
External Content
Your subscription could not be saved. Please try again.
Almost finished… We need to confirm your email address. To complete the subscription process, please click the link in the email we just sent you.
Swiss House of Representatives does not want to recognise Palestine as a state
This content was published on
By 131 votes to 61 with 2 abstentions, the House of Representatives said 'no' to the postulate put forth by the Social Democratic Party.
This content was published on
The peak of the snow accumulation was most likely reached on Monday, wrote glaciologist Matthias Huss on the social media platform X on Tuesday.
US Vice President Harris to attend Ukraine peace conference
This content was published on
US Vice President Kamala Harris and US President Joe Biden's security advisor, Jake Sullivan, will take part in the Ukraine peace conference.
FINMA director expects cooperation and transparency from banks
This content was published on
"I demand complete and unfiltered access to all information", said the director of the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority said in an interview.
Swiss Senate wants additional billions for the army
This content was published on
The increase in the payment framework is intended to ensure that the army budget reaches the target value of 1% of gross domestic product by 2030.
Swiss Senate rejects special fund for army and Ukraine
This content was published on
There will be no CHF15 billion ($17 billion) special fund for the army and reconstruction in Ukraine. The Senate has clearly rejected a motion by its security policy committee.
Earthquake service reports 4.4 magnitude quake in central Switzerland
This content was published on
The earthquake was probably felt throughout Switzerland, according to the Swiss Seismological Service of federal technology institute ETH Zurich.
Swiss army taking part in NATO exercise in Germany
This content was published on
The Swiss army will be taking part in one of the largest air-operations exercises in Europe, which takes place in a different country each year.
This content was published on
Most of the 4,000 members of the armed forces who will be helping with various tasks from June 5 to 19 have now been deployed.
You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here . Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.