 The signing of a code share agreement between Saudi Arabian Airlines and Air France on the route between Saudi Arabia and France has opened the door to Saudia becoming a member of the Sky Team alliance. Airline industry sources expect Saudia to make an announcement about joining Sky Team as early as next month.
If Saudia joins the Sky Team alliance, it will be the first GCC airline to join one of the three major airline alliances, the other two being Star Alliance and Oneworld.
Khaled Al-Molhem, director general of Saudi Arabian Airlines, announced some time ago that Saudia was planning to join one of the three alliances but he did not mention the name. However, it has been reported that Sky Team officials visited the Kingdom this summer to discuss Saudia's possible membership.
The Saudia-Air France deal, which becomes effective on Jan. 10, will allow the two airlines to offer their customers daily code-shared flights on services between Riyadh, Jeddah and Paris. Airbus A320-330s, equipped with the latest technologies and in-flight entertainment systems, will operate these flights.
Sky Team's more than a dozen member-airlines including Air France and KLM operate 13,000 daily flights to 898 destinations in 169 countries.
Air France has cut the number of flights to Jeddah from five a week to three a week. Moreover, whereas the Paris-Jeddah flight used to turn around and go straight back to Paris it now goes on to Djibouti and then flies back from there to Jeddah before heading to Paris.
Meanwhile, Air France flight operations have relocated to the South Terminal at King Abdulaziz International Airport, Jeddah, which is usually operated by Saudi Arabian carriers only. This follows the move by Saudia to code share with the Sky Team airline as a first move toward full alliance membership. Under the agreement, Saudia flights will be transferred from terminal 1 to terminal 2 at Paris-Charles de Gaulle.
In Riyadh, Air France has not yet decided whether to switch from the foreign airlines terminal to the Saudia terminal. An announcement is expected about this in January.
The agreement between Saudia and Air France is in accordance with the provisions of the partnership agreement signed by the two airlines in June 2010. The latter concerns many aspects of cooperation including code-shared flights, lounge access or the use of frequent flyer programs.
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