BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Royal Brunei Airlines (RB), the country's national carrier announced on Wednesday that it has commenced ticket sales for the new flight route between Bandar Seri Begawan and Beijing.
RB said that its first flight to Beijing is scheduled on Oct. 27, 2019.
"RB is one the first of few international airlines selected to operate to the new state-of-the-art Beijing Daxing International Airport in phase one of the new airport opening," the national carrier said.
"The four times weekly flights to Beijing is part of RB's efforts to grow its footprint in China, the number one tourism source market for Brunei," RB added.
In addition to Shanghai and Hong Kong, RB also maintains flights to Chinese cities including Haikou, Nanning, Hangzhou and Changsha. RB plans to increase the flight frequency to Beijing Daxing to daily from Jan. 14, 2020.
"We are delighted to provide the key capital city to capital city connection and fulfill our promise to connect Brunei and Beijing once again," Chief Executive Offer of RB Karam Chand said.
"As Brunei's national carrier, the reintroduction of Beijing flights supports our network development and builds on the strong bilateral relationship between the two countries."
"Beijing presents a huge opportunity for us in one of the fastest-growing markets in the world and hence our plan to increase to daily flights around the Chinese New Year 2020," he added.
The CEO also said that RB is grateful to the Chinese government for the opportunity to connect the two capital cities at the earliest time and further facilitating tourism and trade between China and Brunei. "RB is exploring options to have a Chinese airline collaborate with us via codeshare arrangement on this route."
According to Karam Chand, the Chinese market has fundamentally changed in recent years with high growth in free and independent travelers. These potential customers do their research and generally book online including airline websites.
"We have made a significant investment in launching a Chinese language website and are introducing both AliPay and WeChat as payment solutions for our guests. These new solutions will be available effective today. We are doing everything to ensure Brunei and RB information is readily available and the booking process is seamless for our guests," he added.
