Qatar Airways aims to become one of the world's largest cargo airlines in the next five years with plans to purchase a European firm and refurbish more than a dozen of its passenger planes into dedicated freighters.
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Last Updated: May 04, 2011
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In doing so, the Doha airline will take on some of the world's largest transport companies, such as UPS and FedEx, as well as Emirates Airline. Emirates is the biggest freight airline in the Middle East thanks to its fleet of more than 150 wide-bodied passenger aircraft, which carry tonnes of freight per flight.
Akbar al Baker, the chief executive of Qatar Airways, said he hoped to conclude a 33 per cent purchase of Cargolux, based in Luxembourg and one of the world's biggest air freight companies, within weeks. The European firm would integrate its operations with Qatar Airways to carry freight around the world.
"We want to be one of the major players" by 2015, Mr al Baker said yesterday at the Arabian Travel Market in Dubai. Qatar Airways first considered purchasing a stake in Cargolux in 2004 and now that a 33 per cent shareholding is again up for sale, Mr al Baker said his carrier was interested. "It would make a very potent airline between us and them. Cargolux could feed freight into our network from places we go, and they don't go."
The airline is also considering a plan to retire up to 15 Airbus A330 wide-bodied passenger aircraft. These would be converted into freighters by ripping out the seats to make room for cargo containers, and allow the airline to retire some of its five older Airbus A300 freighters.
Mr al Baker said the final figure to be converted, and the timing, depended on slot availability at the Airbus freighter conversion centre in Germany.
Qatar Airways is one of the world's fastest-growing airlines and last month began flying to its 100th destination. This week it announced plans to begin services to the Ugandan city of Entebbe, Baku in Azerbaijan, and Tblisi, Georgia, all slated for their inaugural flights in November.
They are among the airline's 10 new destinations planned for this year, which come amid a huge programme in which Airbus and Boeing deliver new aircraft every 17 days.
This summer, it is widely expected to order new short-range jets, either the Bombardier C-Series or the Airbus A320neo, as well as more superjumbo Airbus A380s.
As a Middle Eastern carrier, Qatar Airways has been affected by regional unrest, with revenues down 2.8 per cent in the first quarter of the year, compared with last year. Mr al Baker declined to provide actual figures. In addition, the airline's percentage of seats filled, or seat factor, declined 4 per cent over the same period.
Like all airlines, it has been buffeted by high oil prices and Mr al Baker acknowledged it would be forced to raise fares to partially offset increasing jet fuel costs.
The airline is also considering expanding into new services to target the high and low ends of the market. It is considering an all-business-class aircraft, as well as a budget airline subsidiary.
"We are still thinking about an all-business-class service," Mr al Baker said. "We would use it on certain routes with very high demand for premium travel and where Qatar has an open sky arrangement with that country, or extra frequencies allowed in the bilateral arrangements. We see at least six countries that fall in that category."
