Cebu Pacific News Archive

Cebu Pacific maintains domestic leadership with 45% market share

Cebu Pacific (CEB), the country’s low fare leader and leading domestic airline registers a domestic market share of 45% for the month of October and also registered the highest passenger load in its more than 10 year history. The market share figure relates to all domestic markets where the top 2 airlines operate.

CEB carried a total of 366,284 passengers for October, 111% higher than October 2005. Guests carried for the domestic market totaled 318,632, also a record breaking performance for the airline over 108% higher than October 2005.

CEB flies to 20 domestic destinations and operates a total of 624 one-way flights per week. The airline also operates a total of 24 routes in its domestic network and has the newest fleet of planes in the Philippines with a fleet age of less than 9 months.

The steady growth of passenger loads can be attributed to CEB’s aggressive pricing strategy, continuous expansion and opening of new routes, as well as its high quality product offering.

“Now that we are offering to the public the newest planes, lowest fares, the most domestic flights, routes and destinations, we can see that people are indeed flying more and possibly flying for the first time,” Lance Gokongwei, CEB CEO and President said.

“We are very much encouraged by this because we see people traveling despite seasonality. More importantly, we are seeing that tourism is becoming a year-round industry,” Gokongwei added.

Passenger traffic information gathered from airport operations summaries show that CEB domestic market share for October 2006 is at 45% followed by the second airline’s market share at 43%.

Gokongwei also said “This is a milestone for Cebu Pacific but more importantly, we feel that this is indicative of growth for the entire industry and to a larger extent, the economy.”

Now in its 11th year, CEB has the newest fleet in the Philippines and one of the newest in Asia as it operates 12 brand new Airbus aircraft to its 20 domestic and 6 regional destinations. The airline awaits the delivery of two more Airbus aircraft in early 2007 to complete its $670 million re-fleeting program.