THAI may create new domestic carrier

BANGKOK: -- Thai Airways International Plc (THAI) said Thursday it is considering launching a new domestic airline after reports that it would separate its domestic and international business.

Thai Airways is currently conducting a feasibility study on the proposal, according to the air carrier's spokesperson.

"The new airline would offer a more luxurious service than the existing low-cost airline," she said, referring to the company's budget carrier, Nok Air, which mostly operates domestic routes.

The new airline, to be called Thai Orchid, would start operations this year and would be wholly owned by Thai Airways International, unlike Nok Air which has other shareholders.

It said it would probably operate from the existing Don Muang international airport, which is to be superseded by the new Suvarnabhumi Airport due to open later this year.

The move would return Thailand to the situation that existed before 1988 when two carriers operated, dealing with

the domestic and international market respectively.

--The Nation 2006-02-09

Can't really understand the commercial logic of this proposal. A quality domestic-airline - well that IS Thai International, currently.

Nok Air seems to be surviving, as a Low-Cost-Carrier, don't know whether it is actually profitable ? I understand that few if any LCCs, set up by large old international-carriers, are ever very successful commercially, just too much old-management beaurocracy to be eliminated. Look at BA & Go, the subsidiary succeeded, so the parent sold it off !

Why create another set of overheads, for Thai Orchid, and risk losing even more international-business to the competition, by risking degrading the fairly smooth Domestic<->International transit currently provided in their Bangkok hub ?