Qunar to Establish Airline
Tencent Tech, 3/01/16
Chinese Internet firm Baidu's (Nasdaq: BIDU) online travel services subsidiary Qunar (Nasdaq: QUNR) recently confirmed that the company, together with two other Shenzhen-based companies, is preparing to launch an airline. The new airline, to be headquartered in Shenzhen, will mainly operate domestic and short-haul international flights to nearby countries, and Qunar will be in charge of online sales.
Editor's Note: Since the end of last year, nine airlines have indicated that they would be temporarily suspending their cooperation with Qunar. Airlines are also shifting their strategy towards selling tickets directly to consumers in an effort to reduce marketing costs. For example, China Southern Airlines announced on February 23 that it was cutting the price of domestic flights bought through its own website by 60%. These actions by Chinese airlines were a key catalyst in Qunar's decision to set up its own airline, according to Chinese news media reports. For more information on this topic, please see "China Southern Air, Hainan Airlines Halt Cooperation with Qunar," MD 12/31/15 and "Update: 4 Additional Domestic Airlines Stop Cooperation with Qunar," MD 1/04/16 issues.
Keywords: Internet online travel Qunar Baidu BIDU QUNR aviation
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