Wizz Air, FlyNikki and Malev to Serbia

Following a conference organised in order to stimulate airlines to begin low cost flights to Serbia’s capital Belgrade, 3 airlines have announced their interest to commence flights – Wizz Air FlyNikki and Malev Hungarian Airlines, a major threat the struggling national carrier Jat Airways. These airlines should join the current two low cost carriers, German Wings and Norwegian Air Shuttle, that currently operate flights to Belgrade. Wizz Air would make the largest commitment operating to 6 cities from and to Belgrade – one in Spain and one in Germany (the cities are yet undefined), Paris, Milan, London and Gothenburg in Sweden. Malev would commence flights from Budapest to Belgrade while Nikki would commence flights to Vienna. This could seriously harm Serbia’s national carrier that has recently announced that even more workers will lose their jobs (over 800). Furthermore the airline has struggled to maintain services after significantly downsizing its fleet. The 3 new airlines should commence flights to Belgrade from late March 2009 once the summer season starts although their arrival depends if Serbia’s parliament ratifies the Open Skies agreement by then.