Qantas and Emirates have extended their partnership for another five years, but with a few changes.
The pair say the key change will see the airlines ‘better leveraging each other’s networks’, by providing three options to Australia from Europe, via Dubai and Singapore, and direct to Perth.
From March, Qantas will re-route its daily London-Sydney A380 service via Singapore rather than Dubai and upgrade its existing daily Singapore-Melbourne flight from an A330 to an A380.
As previously announced, Qantas’ existing London-Dubai-Melbourne service will be replaced with a direct Dreamliner service flying London-Perth-Melbourne.
The airlines said the changes were designed to ‘reflect customer demand, new aircraft technology and each airline’s respective network strengths’.
Qantas has estimated the changes will bring a yearly net benefit of more than AU$80 million from 2019 onwards.
Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce said the changes represented an evolution of the partnership.
"Our partnership has evolved to a point where Qantas no longer needs to fly its own aircraft through Dubai, and that means we can redirect some of our A380 flying into Singapore and meet the strong demand we’re seeing in Asia.
"Improvements in aircraft technology means the Qantas network will eventually feature a handful of direct routes between Europe and Australia, but this will never overtake the sheer number of destinations served by Emirates and that’s why Dubai will remain an important hub for our customers."
