DRColombo: SriLankan Airlines is strengthening its presence in the U.S. and European markets through the expansion of its existing codeshare agreement with Qatar Airways, with additional connections to serve various cities in these regions.
Vipula Gunatilleka, Group Chief Executive Officer of SriLankan Airlines said: “The expansion of our partnership with Qatar Airways is an important element in SriLankan’s ongoing initiatives to provide seamless connectivity for our valued passengers across a wide range of destinations, apart from increasing the number of cities that we ourselves fly to.”
Accordingly with effect from 8th February 2020, SriLankan will codeshare on Qatar Airways operated flights between Doha and Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, George Bush Intercontinental Airport in the city of Houston in Texas, Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport also in Texas, Boston Logan International Airport, Dulles International Airport in the U.S. capital Washington D.C., Madrid–Barajas Airport in Spain, and Larnaca International Airport in Cyprus. Both airlines offer easy connectivity between Qatar Airways’ hub in Doha’s Hamad International Airport and Colombo’s Bandaranaike International Airport several times a day.
This is the second phase of recent expansion of the codeshare agreement between the two airlines, which are both members of the oneworld global airline alliance that connects passengers to over a thousand cities in more than 180 countries and territories through 13 member airlines. Phase 1 was completed in the last quarter of 2019 and added a large number of destinations to the networks of both airlines.
With the addition of Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth and Boston as codeshare destinations, SriLankan’s route network will span 116 cities in 51 countries. SriLankan already serves Chicago, Washington D.C, Madrid and Larnaca through codeshare agreements with other partner airlines.
Codesharing partnerships are widely used among similar airlines to strengthen their operations in different parts of the world. SriLankan Airlines passengers will now have the option of seamless long distance travel via Doha through one travel booking. SriLankan has a number of codeshare agreements with other airlines.
