Low cost long haul: Norwegian Air drops world’s longest LCC route 

Norwegian is suspending services between London Gatwick and Singapore, which is currently the longest LCC route in the world. The decision to suspend London-Singapore after only a year operating the route highlights the challenges of true long haul operations for LCCs.

It can be difficult for LCCs to achieve a sufficient enough cost advantage compared to FSCs on routes of more than 12 hours, particularly in a high oil price environment. The Singapore-London market - and the broader Southeast Asia-Europe market - is intensely competitive, with several airlines offering aggressively priced one-stop options.

The Europe-North America market, which is generally higher yielding and cheaper to operate because of the shorter length of flight, is more attractive to Norwegian than Europe-Asia. Norwegian also now has new opportunities in the Europe-South America market following the upcoming launch of its new Argentina-based subsidiary, which makes Latin America more strategically important for Norwegian than Asia.