19 October 2009

Garuda set for UK return

Garuda Indonesia is expected to resume flights to the UK by summer 2011 after announcing plans to re-open an Amsterdam-Jakarta service.

The airline is believed to be drawing up plans to deploy a new Boeing 777 to serve one of the London airports by early summer 2011.

The daily Amsterdam to Jakarta service is scheduled to start on June 1, 2010 with flights operating via Dubai.

The route will be served by an Airbus A330-200 with a capacity of 222 passengers, seating 36 in business class and 186 in economy.

The restoration of flights to Europe comes at a time when Garuda is busy reinventing itself as a major carrier in Asia.

An overhaul of the airline staff’s business and service mentality, together with financial and operational restructuring, has seen the airline return to profit and pay down debt under CEO Emirsyah Satar, who joined Garuda as finance chief in 1998.

In an interview with the International Herald Tribune, Satar said, "When I came in, no audit had been done for three years. The company was running on negative cash flow - it was funding itself by issuing debt.

"The first thing we had to do was to get out of the state of denial.

"And we had to remind ourselves that we are not a transportation company but a travel company - that means the customer comes first."

Satar said he is confident he can prepare the company for an IPO next year.

Garuda recently received approval from the European Union to resume services to Europe.
It had been among several Indonesian airlines banned from flying to Europe because of safety concerns which focused on the Indonesia’s aviation watchdog and its failure to oversee airline safety standards in line with EU requirements.

by Phil Davies

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Welcome back!

Wonderful news, will improve the offer and services towards Indonesia and I had the feeling of complimentarity with EK.. great for the Dutch too

By Cristiano Campion, Tuesday, October 20, 2009