Article from BTNews 30 JANUARY 2017
SAS coup for CityJet
In a major expansion, CityJet has acquired Danish airline Cimber, a subsidiary of SAS, and won a six-year wet-lease contract from SAS for regional services from Copenhagen. Both take effect tomorrow, 31 January.
CityJet will continue to operate Cimber’s Copenhagen network for SAS using Cimber’s 11 Bombardier CRJ900 aircraft. CityJet is ordering up to 10 new CRJ900s for this year and next to replace the Cimber fleet.
Under the extended wet-lease contract with SAS, CityJet operates eight CRJ900 jets based in Stockholm and Helsinki. This fleet will increase to 12 in March with the delivery of four additional aircraft ordered last year. The aircraft will be operated exclusively on behalf of SAS in SAS colours and crewed by CityJet staff.
CityJet executive chairman Pat Byrne said: "This new SAS contract and the growth delivered by the acquisition of Cimber advances CityJet’s stated strategy of building its role as a provider of regional jet capacity to airlines across Europe.”
SAS president and CEO Rickard Gustafson added: “CityJet is one of our key strategic partners on regional traffic and this agreement allows us to fly more routes with lower production costs and maintain a large network with frequent departures.”
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