Air Serbia launches historic Belgrade-New York service | ATWOnline

Air Serbia begins Belgrade-New York JFK service Thursday, providing the first direct flights between Serbia and the US in 24 years.

The Serbian carrier is using a two-class Airbus A330-200leased from Jet Airways of India, on the 5X-weekly service. Air Serbia and Jet Airways are part of Etihad Airways’ group of equity partner airlines.

The service was made possible after a series of events: FAA restored Serbia’s category one status in 2014; a bilateral air service agreement was reached between Serbia and the US; and Air Serbia—formerly Jat Airways—was rebranded, re-fleeted and restructured after Abu Dhabi-based Etihad took a 49% stake in the airline.

With its 90-year history through Jat, the company is the world’s second oldest airline and had a long legacy of success. But the civil wars through the 1990s devastated travel demand and saw sanctions placed on the country that restricted flying.

Dane Kondić, the Australian-Serb CEO of Air Serbia, spoke to ATW about what it means to reinstate direct US service.

“With the breakup of the country and the decaying of its aviation, Serbia slipped from Category one to Category two, so that had to be addressed before we could even contemplate service and it was all hand to glove,” he said. “Twenty-four long years with no direct service is essentially a generation. But Etihad was the white horse; if not for them, there would have been no talks whatsoever of this happening; Etihad was the enabler.

The first pillar of Air Serbia’s US network strategy was to codeshare with airberlin, Germany’s second-largest carrier and another Etihad partner airline, on seven US routes—JFK, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, San Francisco and Fort Meyers, Florida.

The second pillar was the June 23 launch of Air Serbia’s own 5X-weekly service to JFK. The airline also has relationships—not codeshares—with American Airlines and New York-based JetBlue Airways that provide preferential rates within the US and other services.

“Launching flights to New York was the logical start because of its large catchment area,” Kondić said. “It’s a new brand, not just a new service. Americans don’t know much about Serbia beyond the war, so we know it will take time and the easiest way to go initially is with the low-hanging fruit—ethnic Serbians in that catchment area. So that’s the first place you go hunting.  But in the long term, we are looking to re-establish Serbia and Belgrade as a destination. It’s also a gateway to the Adriatic and many Americans are going there. We are also hearing from business people and their first question is ‘how the hell do we get there?’, so there will be a halo effect as we make it easier for them to get there … the money will follow and, on the cargo side, there will also be opportunities for exporters.”

Kondić also noted the strong student ties between the two countries, providing the basis for a young, future market.

Air Serbia is fully utilizing Etihad partner assets, leasing the A330 from Jet and training its pilots at Alitalia simulator facilities and cabin crew at Etihad academies. “It’s the best example of embodying the story of the partnership,” Kondić said. “This is not just marketing talk, it’s synergy in action.”

Operating a single aircraft on the route is a risk, Kondić acknowledges, but the Etihad partnership also helps to mitigate that risk. There are resources that can be brought into play from Alitalia, airberlin and Etihad if needed as well as from European codeshare airlines like Polish LOT.

The A330 has been fitted with 18 seats in business class in a herringbone, 1-1-1 configuration, and 236 seats in economy in a 2-4-2 configuration. Borrowing an Etihad concept, there will be an onboard au pair to assist families with young children.

Air Serbia, which is still 50% owned by the Serbian government, reported a 2015 net profit of €3.9 million ($4.4 million), up 44% compared to a €2.7 million net profit in 2014 and is being held up as a poster child for public-private partnerships.

“We came back from the brink and we are very confident in the future,” Kondić said.

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