Wizz Air sets up Norwegian base

As noted in a previous post, if there is an airline (perhaps even the ONLY airline) that is expanding in these very troubled times for the aviation industry, this is Wizz Air.

Although Eastern Europe continues to be its core market, and some of the growth is happening in this region, the purple-pink ultra low cost carrier is also dipping its toes in other places.

There is, of course, the new flagship Abu Dhabi base, a rather ambitious project, in cooperation with a local partner, in a region that is not precisely devoid of competition. This is not just a token gesture, if all goes according to plan, Wizz Air aims to base some 50 A321neo aircraft at Abu Dhabi, which gives an idea of the scale of this project.

But also some new bases in Western Europe. Wizz Air has already a significant footprint there, but the novelty is that it is now setting base to operate domestic flights in places like Italy, where it is opening new bases at Milan-Malpensa and Catania (Sicily) and Norway.

The Norwegian base, at Oslo Gardermoen, starts with flights to Bergen, Trondheim and Tromso. An interesting question is whether Wizz Air will be able to keep its ultra-competitive cost structure in such a high-cost market as Norway, particularly when it comes to labour costs…

In any case, I guess not the best news for struggling Norwegian and fragile SAS, the two locally-based carriers.