Wizz Air: to Dubai and beyond! Pushing the frontier of the narrowbody LCC model

The United Arab Emirates' newest airport, Dubai World Central (DWC), opened its passenger terminal on 27-Oct-2013 and its first commercial passengers. The operator was Wizz Air, the Eastern/Central European LCC, with a flight from Budapest. Wizz Air Group (which includes Wizz Air Ukraine) also launched Bucharest, Sofia and Kiev from DWC as the winter season commenced.

According to Wizz Air CEO József Váradi, Wizz Air expects to handle 250,000 passengers on services to DWC in the first year of operations. Based on the four routes launched this week, this would imply load factors averaging 95%. Although Wizz Air's 2012 load factor was more than 85%, this seems very ambitious for new routes, even in the hyperbolic world of low-cost airlines. More likely, Wizz Air plans to add frequencies and/or routes through the year.

Either way, it demonstrates the carrier's confidence in taking the narrowbody LCC model further than most on routes that look to be under-penetrated. Mr Váradi is even talking of adding flights to India from DWC.