The $20,000 Residence suite on Etihad Airways’s first Airbus A380 superjumbo, featuring three rooms and a dedicated butler, is already sold out for the first 10 flights, the Abu Dhabi carrier said.
Bookings for the ultra-luxurious cabin boasting a double bed, living area and shower cubicle are running far ahead of the usual 50 per cent reservation rate for first-class berths, the Etihad chief executive James Hogan said today in Dubai.
“We’ve been quite happy with the takeup,” Mr Hogan said at an industry conference. “There’s a market there.”
Etihad’s initial A380 will fly between the carrier’s Abu Dhabi base and London from December 27. Mr Hogan is betting the industry’s most luxurious inflight product will help lure top-paying travellers from the likes of Emirates and Qatar Airways, which introduced the model last month, as well as global operators such as Singapore Airlines, which pioneered the plane in 2007.
Etihad has 10 A380s on firm order and also plans to deploy aircraft two and three on the London route, which will become an all-superjumbo service with three daily flights. The model will also serve Sydney and New York later in 2015.
Emirates is working on a first-class upgrade, while Qatar Airways has limited the offering - which it says includes the industry’s widest seat - to its A380s and Boeing 787s.
Mr Hogan said that Arabian Gulf carriers are finding expansion plans under threat from regulators in Europe and the United States, even where bilateral accords should permit great competition through additional services and cooperation with local partners.
“What we are seeing is huge pressure from the US and Europe challenging the air service agreements of the Gulf airlines,” he said. “That protectionism, we argue, certainly constrains global development and restricts choice.”
A dispute with German authorities over a code-share agreement between flight Etihad and Air Berlin, in which the Middle Eastern carrier owns a minority holding, is “all about protecting” Deutsche Lufthansa, he said.
Lufthansa chief executive Carsten Spohr, who took over in May, has cited competition from Gulf airlines as his biggest challenge, saying that while the company “can handle” discount operators such as Ryanair that are on a level playing field, “with the Gulf carriers it’s different.”
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