Cebu Pacific’s ME route among fastest growing in its network

The Philippines’ leading carrier, Cebu Pacific Air, also known as CEB, rounded up its fastest growing routes for the first nine months of 2015, with its low-cost long-haul flights making the cut.
The countries or regions with the highest passenger growth from January to September 2015, compared to the same period last year, were Australia, the Middle East and Japan.
Based on September 2014 to September 2015 data from Australia’s Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics, CEB garnered a 38 percent market share on the Manila-Sydney route. Overall traffic between Manila and Sydney also grew by 67 percent since CEB entered the market in September 2014.
CEB’s Middle East growth was driven by the launch of Kuwait, Riyadh and Doha in recent months, as part of the airline’s expansion in the region.
Meanwhile, to cater to the growing interest of Filipinos when it comes to travel to Japan, CEB expanded its Japan network with a direct Cebu-Narita (Tokyo) route beginning March of 2015.
In the Philippines, CEB was able to stimulate more travel between Manila and Tagbilaran (Bohol) with additional twice daily flight frequencies. It also stimulated travel between Cebu and Tandag, after the airline launched flights to this Surigao del Sur city in June 2014. Passengers for both routes grew by over 100 percent from January to September 2015, compared to the same period last year.
“We’re pleased to see the CEB Effect in these markets, and will continue to study destinations where we can grow traffic, said CEB VP (marketing and distribution) Candice Iyog.
—EB