From March 29, 2009, the start of the summer time table, Lufthansa and Brussels Airlines will deepen their cooperation and expand their existing partnership, ahead of Lufthansa's plans to take a 45 per cent stake in Brussels Airlines (subsequently to be raised to 100 per cent), and Brussels Airlines' entry in to the Star Alliance.

Codeshare flights on cross-border routes
From the end of this week, numerous Lufthansa and Brussels Airlines flights will be operated on a codeshare basis under the partner airline’s flight number. In future, Lufthansa and Brussels Airlines passengers will have access to both airlines’ route networks. Initially, this service will apply to flights between Brussels and Frankfurt, Berlin, Hamburg, Hanover, Nuremberg and Stuttgart as well as to selected European destinations. At a later date, it will be extended to other flights, particularly to and from Munich.

Frequent flyer programme partnership
The two carriers are launching a frequent flyer programme partnership. Brussels Airlines Privilege members will then be able to earn award and status miles on all flights operated by Lufthansa and also redeem any miles accumulated prior to that date for award tickets on Lufthansa flights. Conversely, Lufthansa Miles & More members will have their account credited with all the premium, status and HON Circle miles earned on flights operated by Brussels Airlines and will also be able to book award flights with Brussels Airlines.

In addition, elite status customers of both carriers will enjoy additional privileges such as more generous free baggage allowances and preferential baggage claim. Lufthansa status customers flying with Brussels Airlines will also be able to use Brussels Airlines’ Business Class check-in counters. Likewise, Brussels Airlines’ Platinum and Gold passengers will have access to Lufthansa’s First or Business Class check-in counters.

Reciprocal lounge privileges
Since mid-February, both airlines have granted their premium customers reciprocal use of the partner’s lounges. Members of Brussels Airlines’ frequent flyer programme Privilege who have attained Platinum status can thus use all Lufthansa Senator and Business Lounges worldwide. Likewise, since February, Lufthansa HON Circle members, Senators and First Class passengers have enjoyed access to Brussels Airlines lounges. In addition, from 29 March, Business Class passengers flying Brussels Airlines will be able to use all Lufthansa’s Business lounges, while Lufthansa customers will have access to Brussels Airlines’ Business Lounge at Brussels.

Joint ground operations under one roof
Whenever possible, Lufthansa and Brussels Airlines aim to locate their service desks and check-in areas close to one another at airports. At the start of the summer timetable, Brussels Airlines will therefore move into Terminal 2 at Hamburg Airport, where Lufthansa and other Star Alliance partners are located. At a later date, in line with the Star Alliance’s “Under One Roof” strategy, Brussels Airlines plans to relocate to Terminal 2 at Munich, which is used exclusively by Lufthansa and its Star Alliance partners.

The entry of Air India in to the Star Alliance is delayed by at least one year to the first quarter of 2010.

Star Alliance founder, Lufthansa was a sponsor for Air India joining the Star Alliance. Since 2004, Air India has operated code-sharing flights with Lufthansa between Germany and India.

18 months ago, the Government of India decided to merge Air India and the erstwhile Indian (formerly Indian Airlines). The process of merger, which was to have been completed in 2008, has been severely delayed due to "integration" issues. Apparently there is major confusion at even the most basic levels between the staff of the two airlines, with no clarity on who is responsible for what. Where have we heard of this before?


While Star Alliance and Air India signed a non-disclosure agreement last year, the compliance is yet to be done. The IT systems are no where close to integration and Air India has not yet, even informed the Star Alliance, on which of the two systems it will finally be using. This is proving to the major sticking point for Air India's entry in to the global alliance.

Adding complexity to this issue are reports that mandarins at the Ministry of Civil Aviation of Air India owner, Government of India, are "upset" at reported talks between Jet Airways and the Star Alliance, whom they perceive as a threat to Air India.


Previously Jet Airways had an announced policy of remaining alliance neutral preferring to sign one-on-one bi-laterals instead. Delays by the US Federal Aviation Administration on Jet's code share deal with Star Alliance founder United Airlines have launched a diplomatic protest by the Indian government.

However, the extreme operating environment due to the on-going economic slowdown, the sheer size of India, and the desire of the Star Alliance to grow to 50 members especially regional airlines, may be tilting the scales in favour of Jet Airways joining the Star Alliance.

and I see not reason why can India not have two airlines participating in the alliance.

The Star alliance press office announced that at their annual Board Meeting, the CEOs of the Star Alliance member airlines have voted to accept the application of Brussels Airlines to become a future member of the alliance.

Brussels Airlines is the Belgian airline offering the widest choice of flights to and from the “capital” of Europe. With a fleet of 45 aircraft the airline operates some 300 daily flights to 55 European airports and 15 African destinations.

Glenn Tilton, Chairman, President and CEO of United, in his role as chairman of the meeting said, “Brussels Airlines further strengthens the Star Alliance by offering greater connectivity throughout Europe and Africa to better serve the international travel needs of all our customers.”

Bernard Gustin, Managing Director of Brussels Airlines, said “We are very happy with this invitation from Star Alliance and we look forward to becoming a member carrier. Together we will be able to bring all the advantages of Star Alliance to our customers, both at the heart of Europe where we have our state-of-the-art hub, and to Africa, our second home where we have more than 80 years of experience.”

For the upcoming integration in Star Alliance, Brussels Airlines will be assisted by its sponsor Lufthansa. Wolfgang Mayrhuber, Chairman of the Executive Board and CEO of Deutsche Lufthansa AG, said, “Brussels Airlines is known for its reliability and brings into the alliance a trusted product. The leading Belgian carrier will significantly increase the presence of Star Alliance at Brussels Airport and will offer the easiest access to a couple of African destinations new to the network.”

Through its membership in Star Alliance, Brussels Airlines will be able to offer its passengers a variety of benefits. On the network side for instance, the airline will be able to offer its passengers seamless travel across the Star Alliance network which will expand to cover 1,074 destinations in 174 countries*.

Frequent Flyers in the Brussels Airlines Privilege programme will be able to collect and redeem miles on all other Star Alliance member carriers.

In order to provide all the alliance benefits, the specialised teams at Brussels Airlines, Star Alliance and its member carriers will now be working on the integration process, which once completed, will make Brussels Airlines a part of the Star Alliance network, currently consisting of 21 members.

Brussels Airlines is also a close partner with Indian carrier, Mumbai based, Jet Airways. At the same time, Lufthansa has announced its intention to help the state owned national carrier Air India, also based out of Mumbai, to become a member of the Star Alliance.

Scandinavian Airlines Systems (SAS) is in talks with national carrier Air India to ink a pro-rata agreement for providing connectivity to its passengers from New Delhi to seven more domestic cities. According to a report in today’s Economic Times, SAS will also look at other areas of co-operation with Air India such as ground handling (maintenance and servicing of aircraft) and catering informed Lennart Paulsson, Director and General Manager for India, Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS).

“We are in negotiations to work out a pro-rata agreement for connectivity from seven different domestic cities to Delhi from where we operate direct flights to Copenhagen.

The locations under consideration are Pune, Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Kolkata, Goa and Kochi.

The agreement will enable SAS passengers to get connectivity between these cities and Delhi,” stated Paulsson. SAS is targeting the business travellers segment in India as more Scandinavian companies are setting up shop in New Delhi and the Indian companies are looking at expanding overseas. Trade between India and the Scandinavian countries has grown 300 per cent in the past six years.

“An SAS passenger from Europe can connect to any of these cities from Delhi without having to worry about transfer details.

Similarly, an SAS passenger from any of these cities will be able to connect to any destination on the airline’s network without having to handle separate confirmations and baggage transfers,” informed Paulsson.

SAS, which announced its foray into India last month after it suspended its operations in 2002, currently operates three direct flights a week between New Delhi and Copenhagen. The airline is the national carrier for Sweden, Norway and Denmark, and does not operate flights from any other Indian city.

SAS currently provides domestic connectivity through a tie-up with Jet Airways. However, it felt that Jet is in competition to SAS as it operates flights to London as well as Brussels from where connectivity to the Scandinavian countries is good.

Air India also operates flights to Europe, but SAS felt that the Indian national carrier is a natural ally since it is slated to join the Star Alliance which has the Scandinavian airline as one of the founder members. Air India is already in talks to becoming the 22nd member of the Star Alliance.

Jet Airways, will forge a frequent flyer partnership with United Airlines, one of the largest international carriers based in the United States, effective November 15, 2008.

With this partnership, Jet Airways’ JetPrivilege members may now earn and redeem JPMiles on the entire global network of United Airlines, and, United Airlines’ Mileage Plus members may now earn and redeem their miles on Jet Airways' services to 64 destinations in India and beyond. More details are available on Jet Airways' website.

United Airlines operates more than 3,200 flights a day to more than 200 U.S. domestic and international destinations from its hubs in Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington D.C.

United, along with German carrier Lufthansa, had commenced the Star Alliance. Readers will recall that recently Lufthansa has committed itself to helping Air India become a partner of the Star Alliance. It will be interesting to see how this partnership evolves. Ideally, I would like to see Jet Airways become a full fledged Star Alliance member.

With the theme – “You’ve earned it”, Star Alliance launched its new multi-platform brand campaign on Monday, October 20th, 2008. The campaign is aimed at increasing awareness and familiarity of the Alliance customer benefits, with a special emphasis on the value of global recognition for the frequent International traveller.

“Working away from home on international business trips can take its toll on the global frequent traveller, and the potential rewards for such travel are often simply not clear enough. Star Alliance was the first international airline alliance specifically set up with the frequent international traveller in mind, created to focus on the development of rewards, products and services aimed at providing hassle-free multi-airline, multi-destination travel,” said Mark Davies, Director of Marketing Communications for Star Alliance.

The campaign is supported by a series of short documentaries called “A Meeting of Minds”, produced in association with CNBC International, where budding entrepreneurs interview global business leaders on the art of doing business better, especially in emerging markets, and how these business leaders have taken their businesses from local to international.

One of the episodes shows entrepreneur Anthony Pereira, founder of U.S. renewable energy company, AltPower, meeting Simon Woodroffe, founder of Yo@ Company Holdings, which created Yo! Sushi and Yo! Hotel. All 10 episodes are lively, fast moving and show business leaders in London, New York, Beijing and Shanghai. These short films are available for viewing at www.staralliance.com.

“Being recognised as a special person across the alliance is not an easy logistical task to achieve, yet with more than 11 years of experience in this field, we know we’re best placed to be at the forefront of this global challenge. Through this campaign, we are aiming simply to remind our core international audience of the benefits we’re spearheading for the industry, including alliance-wide priority baggage; Connection Centres at our major hubs and Alliance lounges to name but a few. After all, our frequent international travellers have truly earned it!,” added Davies.

Complementing the campaign, Star Alliance has also developed an international business etiquette guide to recognise the importance of different cultures when doing business around the world. This has been produced in association with international magazine Monocle.

The campaign was designed, together with advertising agency Touch DDB, to highlight the fact that Star Alliance products, services and rewards were developed to help customers alleviate the stress of travel.

The multi-platform media campaign, developed with media agency MEC, has advertisements on targeted news, business and travel websites that direct visitors to a video landing page on our Alliance website. The campaign will also run in Star Alliance’s 21 member carriers’ in-flight magazines, on entertainment channels and in posters at London-Heathrow and Paris-Charles de Gaulle airports.

According to the Press Trust of India, German flag carrier Lufthansa, today said, it will act as a mentor to Indian state carrier Air India to become a member of Star Alliance, a global grouping of top airlines.

"Lufthansa is the mentor for Air India and we will work together to get the latter on board the Star Alliance," the German airlines' South Asia director Werner Heesen said here.

However, Heesen said his company had no plans at present for financial investments in India.

"Financial investments are not on the strategic map of Lufthansa for India," he said when asked about the airlines' plans for South Asia in the wake of the current aviation industry crisis.

He said Lufthansa currently operated 55 flights from seven Indian cities to three destinations in Germany--Berlin, Frankfurt and Munich.

All Lufthansa flights have nearly 60 per cent bookings from travellers of Indian origin, he said. "Indians form about two-thirds of the total passengers on our flights from Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Pune," Heesen said.

So, Lufthansa was consciously planning its routes to suit Indian travellers. "Also, we are ensuring that Indians get to feel at home by including all types of Indian cuisine, Indian attendants speaking the languages of different regions and in-flight entertainment with local content," he added.