A new low-cost airline, Intensive Air, appears to have captured a lucrative budget travel niche in the South African market by undercutting scheduled carriers by over 50%.
An established charter operator, based at Johannesburg International Airport, Intensive Air received approval for a scheduled air transport licence last month, having flown on a temporary licence for the past two months. It operates three no-frills services a week between Cape Town and Johannesburg using an ex-Scandinavian Airlines 75-seat Fokker F28 Mk4000.
Chief executive Kobus Louw is a Johannesburg heart surgeon with a commercial degree in aviation who has previously run air ambulance service Care Airlines. Intensive Air also provides F28 charter services for Air Botswana. It has two more F28s coming from SAS.
Modelled on the UK's easyJet, Intensive is offering one-class return fares on its scheduled domestic services from as low as R500 ($71). The airline has been achieving load factors of over 80%, Louw claims, forcing Intensive to charter a larger McDonnell Douglas DC-9 from Million Air in late July.
Fuel price hikes have forced South African airlines to raise their fares by 6%, but Intensive Air says it will keep down its prices, for the time being.
Source: Flight International
