The CEO of Wizz Air, Jozsef Varadi, has said his airline is looking into increasing the number of “aircraft, employees and services” in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Speaking to the “Klix.ba” portal, Mr Varadi noted, “I must say that Bosnia and Herzegovina has held up well against the pandemic. It was flexible and resilient during the crisis and performed stronger than most traditional European markets in which Wizz Air operates. There were measures introduced by the government, but there was movement of people. More people travelled from Bosnia and Herzegovina than other countries. We believe Bosnia is a good market to invest in. There are a lot of investment prospects, as well as opportunities to bring more airlines into the country and launch new routes. We will be seeing that in the coming months”.
Wizz Air is Bosnia and Herzegovina’s largest carrier with bases in Tuzla and Sarajevo, the latter opening in May, as well as flights from Banja Luka. “Opening a base in Sarajevo was the right decision. We did it two months ago, so it is too early to speak about results, but it is going well. The market is very good. Demand for Wizz Air flights and our services is large and we will look what more can be done here”, Mr Varadi noted. He added, “We were thinking about launching Sarajevo for some time. It wasn’t a rash decision. I was in Sarajevo three to four years ago and I had the idea of commencing flights from there. We tried to reach an agreement, but it took us some time to realise how to do it. That was a bit difficult with the onset of Covid-19. There weren’t a lot of airlines able to restore capacity or expand. We had the opportunity to reach an agreement which resulted in the opening of our base in Sarajevo”.
Last month, Wizz Air launched operations from its third destination in Bosnia and Herzegovina - Banja Luka. “Currently, we have bases in Sarajevo and Tuzla but at some point it can happen in Banja Luka too. We started flying from Banja Luka around the same time we commenced Sarajevo, so it is possible that we will open a base in that city”, Wizz Air’s CEO noted. He concluded that the airline was looking to further expand in the country. “Covid-19 has proved how flexible the market is. From our perspective, Bosnia and Herzegovina is a market in which to invest. This, combined with all the development I see going on, encourages us to think of what’s next in terms of increasing the number of aircraft, employees and services. That is something we are working on and I am pretty sure that Bosnia and Herzegovina can be a winner in all of this”, Mr Varadi said.
I'm hoping they will start flights to Mostar which is really struggling. That way we would have all 4 airports in BiH active.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately Management in OMO is impotent. People there were politically hired by HDZ and they are just burning government money.
DeleteLets be realistic where could flights from OMO be profitable to year round?
DeleteNorth Africa plus Middle East with parts of Central Asia, Kazakhstan in particular.
Delete+100
Delete@14:55
DeleteScandinavia. Over a quarter of the area’s pre-war population lives there.
Plus southern Germany where the rest lives :)
Delete*rest of the city lives
DeleteWhat is their best performing route from Sarajevo?
ReplyDeleteHappy they're happy.
ReplyDeleteRyanair not reaching agreement with Tuzla coincidently must have nothing to with Wizz....
ReplyDeleteNo problem at all for Ryanair. They just can relocate to BEG -open a base there and kill off Wizz by offering really cheap prices.
DeleteBecause Wizz is not cheap at all at Belgrade!
What new routes could we see from Sarajevo.
ReplyDeleteBarcelona
DeleteBCN, LIS, BGY, BER, OSL, BRI, PRG
DeleteWhy Barcelona?
DeleteBecause there is always demand to BCN all over the world. Even KIV, Ukranian cities, VAR and SKP connected to it.
DeleteLet's be honest, I'm from Bosnia and there is struggle to fill planes to London. Imagine how would that be for Barcelona and other smaller cities.
DeleteEven LJU does not have flights to BCN, and now you expect SJJ to get them..
DeleteAnonymous 11:45 we need visa for London but for Barcelona not. For me it can work better.
DeleteYou can't compare London and Barcelona because of the UK's visa regime.
DeleteZaragoza would make a lot of sense in summer.
DeleteZaragoza is in the middle of nowhere, there is basically nothing to see there and the summers are dead hot, with over 40 degrees Celsius, also the city is rather poor and devastated for spanish terms, with not so developed economy, so I really don't know where did you pull out Zaragoza from with Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Sevilla, Malaga, Bilbao around....
DeleteZaragoza is the fifth biggest city in Spain and it's located at the crossroads between Barcelona, Madrid and Bilbao, not exactly in the middle of nowhere.
DeleteWith a major Stellantis car factory (Peugeot, Citroën, Opel), Inditex's European logistics hub (Zara, Stradivarius, Pull&Bea, etc.), Amazon Web Services (AWS) regional data centre, and the second biggest cargo airport in Spain, it's not precisely a poor and devastated area in terms of business and industry.
Additionally, it is also home to one of the most visited religious landmarks in Spain: Basilica del Pilar. Its food culture is renowned all around Spain, as are some of its wine regions (Somontano, Campo de Borja, Cariñena). And to top it off, Zaragoza is the home town of one of the most revered Spanish painters of the 18th century: Goya.
Interesting that they are thinking about basing planes in Banja Luka. They could indirectly compete against Ryan in Zagreb. I think they have lost the opportunity to position themselves there.
ReplyDeleteIt seams a real fight between them in BiH.
DeleteBNX makes sense especially since they have lower costs than ZaG.
DeleteNice!
ReplyDeleteFirst he need to sort out his colossal planning mistake and solve the serious crew shortage. Flights were cancelled by the dozen last week for lack of crew and five aircraft had to be wet leased from other companies to cover the holes despite half of Wizz Air's fleet is still grounded. Now pilots are hired in a hurry which will not help safety. The mantra of Wizz being the winner of the pandemic was empty blahblah as its management is not up to the task to say the least.
ReplyDeleteSo that is why a Spicejet A320 was operating a flight from Skopje to Gothenburg the other day on behalf of Wizz Air :D
DeleteYepp.
DeleteNice work BNX and I'm happy they diversified their offer and no longer rely just on Ryanair.
ReplyDeleteGood to see more fights are coming.
ReplyDelete*flights
DeleteW6's growth in our region is bad news for JU.
ReplyDeleteIsn't it bad for every airline?
DeleteThe only serious airline based on our region is JU.
DeleteThere are many serious airlines flying in our region. Or you believe for example Lufthansa that has more transfer passengers from Sarajevo than Air Serbia isn't affected by Wizz Air introducing flights?
DeleteGlad to see that you admitting loosing the argument when you are starting about airlines FLYING to our region instead of airlines BASED in our region.
DeleteNowhere in your original comment did you mention based or flying airlines. Either way, you have no data to back up what you said. It's just what you are hoping or wishing for. So there is no argument to loose.
DeleteOn all my comments I am writing about airlines BASED in our region.
DeletePut on your glasses and read them again.
"W6's growth in our region is bad news for JU."
DeleteWhere does it mention based airlines?
Either way you are just expressing your wishes as you don't have anything to support your hopes.
Legacy airlines will be toast at SJJ.
DeleteAgree with A 09:28 - this will hurt JU as it relies on transfer traffic. LCC were able to kick them out in KBP.
DeleteAnd OU does not fly from SJJ?
DeleteWell FR's expansion in ZAG hurt OS and LH more than it did JU. Sane should happen in SJJ.
DeleteGood news. Wish them success post corona.
ReplyDeleteI really hope they establish a base in BNX.
ReplyDeleteThat would be a real attack on Rayan. Hopefully their competition will bring more flights to BiH.
DeleteWell done BiH!
ReplyDeleteAmazing how SJJ suddenly opened up to the world. I'm sure W6 will base a second A320 and launch more routes and add to the existing ones.
ReplyDeleteI don't trust Wizz air.
ReplyDeleteLong overdue and welcome news for B&H. Bosnia will really benefit from a long term stable airline presence, which is key to economic growth.
ReplyDeleteThey have too many bases, they cannibalize from each other ...
ReplyDeleteBanjaluka really is a surprise. Wizz sends A321 on more than 90% of flights.
ReplyDeleteI did not know it.
DeleteThanks
Wizzair should sandwich Ryanair in Zagreb by opening bases in Banja Luka and Ljubljana.
DeleteThese both airports have enourmous potential.
Varadi also should kickstart the long anticipated base in Belgrade before Ryanair comes in.
^ i mean the long anticipated expansion in Belgrade.
DeleteA base there is already.
I dont think TZL, BNX and SJJ can coexist as bases for Wizz. If BNX is performing that well they should switch their base from TZL there and Tuzla market can be served from BNX and SJJ.
DeleteIn fact they would send A321 on all flights to BNX but Dortmund has runway restrictions so they have to send A320.
DeleteTZL je vec par godina u zaostatku sa Wizz air,nema novih destinacija i pozitvnih info. oko razvoja a postize dobre rezultate...
ReplyDeleteCroatia air will start flying from Mostar as it's niche market to the rest of EU. Financing already in place.
ReplyDeletethen they should have AOC in BiH, register aircraft in BiH, in order to fly from Mostar elsewhere than Zagreb
DeleteNo they don't. As an EU carrier they can operate flights between any EU city and BIH, member of open skies agreement. Not doing that for at least last decade, just witness my claim of them being missed opportunities World Champion
DeleteWhat financing is already in place, and where from exactly? The Zagreb - Mostar route was financed by the airport taxes from Sarajevo Airport (bizzare in my opinion), and now those taxes have been thankfully abolished.
DeleteBoth Wizz Air and Rhyan Air are very good for ex-Yu countries. They allow people to fly regionally for affordable rates while not being a threat to Air Serbia. They also fly out of cities where other airlines, including AS and CA would never fly from.
ReplyDeleteNot for LJU, they don't like LCCs, they need to be a premium airport.
Delete