We’ve never had it so good, travelling around
South East Asia, particularly Thailand, with increasing
numbers of opportunities to take low cost flights.

Thai Airways International recently announced that it
would form a budget airline, Sky Asia, with five domestic
partners to fend off competition from a crop of new
low-cost carriers. Sky Asia will start operations in the
second quarter of this year.

Thai AirAsia, to be launched next month, will also
compete with privately owned domestic Thai carriers such as
Phuket Air, www.phuketairlines.com
Bangkok Airways www.bangkokair.com and PB
Air www.pbair.com that
has several routes in Thailand including: Lampang,
Phetchabun Roi-et, Sakonnakhon, Nakhon Phanom Krabi, Nakhon
Si Thammarat and overseas: Danang, Luang Prabang,
Bagan.

Another Thai domestic carrier, Orient Thai, http://www.orient-thai.com
launched a no-frills airline last month with a one-way
ticket to Chiang Mai at half the current Thai Airways
market price. Its other routings include Bangkok to
Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Phuket, South Korea

Malaysian based Air Asia www.airasia.com says that it
is Asia’s first low fare no frills airline to introduce
“ticketless” travelling, and has flights within
Malaysia and to Singapore and Thailand.

Indonesian based Lion Air currently flies to 32
destinations, including four regional flights connecting
Jakarta with Kuala Lumpur, Penang, Singapore and Ho Chi
Minh City. They plan to start selling business class seats
underlines its attempt not to position itself as a low-cost
carrier. They say: “Our air-fares may be the
cheapest, but we reduce costs through the choice of
aircraft – single-type MD82, which are bigger than
the Boeing 737, commonly used by other domestic
airlines.

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