Firefly offers direct Kuala Lumpur-Haikou connections via charter division

 Boeing 737-400

Firefly now offers direct flights between Kuala Lumpur and Haikou, China under scheduled-charter collaboration with Concept Holidays Sdn Bhd. The Kuala Lumpur-Haikou connection is Firefly’s second scheduled-charter flight into China; the first being Kuala Lumpur-Nanning flights, which commenced in April 2012.

In the collaboration, Firefly will operate the flights at once a week for Concept Holidays Sdn Bhd, which has blocked all the seats to be packaged with hotel accommodation and ground tours. Concept Holidays Sdn Bhd will also be responsible for the marketing and sale of the packaged tours.

“We are pleased to be working with Concept Holidays on the scheduled-charter flight into Haikou, the capital of Hainan Island after the incredible success of the Kuala Lumpur-Nanning flights,” says Ignatius Ong, Chief Executive Officer of Firefly.

“In the short space of six months, scheduled-charter flights have become an important, albeit modest, revenue contributor to Firefly. And with our experience in managing charter flights, ability to meet our clients’ business needs and reputation for offering premium flight experiences at reasonable rates, we are confident we would be able to grow this segment of our business further. Our immediate focus would be to work with our partners to offer more connections into China because of the growing demand from both the leisure and business markets.

“Additionally, the natural progression from operating scheduled-charter flights would be to tap the MICE market. We’ve had some experience organising MICE holidays for selected clients to great success and we look forward to working with the right partners to create more memorable MICE experiences for our clients.”

The inaugural Kuala Lumpur-Haikou flight departed yesterday at 10.25am from the Main Terminal, of KL International Airport carrying 98 passengers. The flight utilised Firefly’s Boeing 737-400 aircraft, which has the capacity of 160 passengers and a maximum flight range of four hours. In-flight experiences can also be tailored to suit the passenger profile or destination that the charter client wishes to fly to.

Firefly’s charter division can be reached at charter@fireflyz.com.my