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Gulf-US airline partnerships: idiosyncratic but the way forward. American Airlines to Abu Dhabi?

Analysis

Whisper it quietly, but Delta and United are dependent on Gulf carrier connections for their Middle East flights. The larger US-Gulf carrier partnerships are between Emirates and JetBlue, as well as American Airlines with both Etihad Airways and Qatar Airways. The latter two are intriguing as American is forcefully involved in the allegations against Gulf carriers; JetBlue is not and in fact strongly supports the Gulf three's expansion. JetBlue will for example open an Orlando-Mexico City service to take feed from Emirates' new Dubai-Orlando service. With Emirates going double daily into Seattle, it could look to replicate with local carrier Alaska Airlines the partnership it has with JetBlue.

Etihad in Mar-2015 said it placed 180,000 passengers onto US carrier networks in 2014 - 493 a day - as well as 50,000 in the first two months of 2015, or 847 a day; around a fifth of Etihad's US passengers connect to a US airline. American Airlines has been a primary recipient of this traffic and has realised the traffic opportunities it is leaving behind. With Etihad serving Dallas-Abu Dhabi only three times a week, there is opportunity for American Airlines to launch its own service to Abu Dhabi and expand its partnership with Etihad. A deeper Gulf partnership will help American, but they are not alone among north American airlines whose interests may be best served by closer links.

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