New routes key to Finnair Asian revenue target

Finland's flagship airline, Finnair, plans to add a destination in Asia every year to its flight schedule in an ambitious bid to double its revenue from Europe-Asia traffic by 2020, a senior executive said.

The airline's chief operations officer, Ville Iho, said the company was considering adding Chinese destinations as part of the plan but refused to disclose which.

Speaking to reporters touring Finland on a trip organised by the country's foreign ministry, Iho said the focus on Asia made sense given the maturity of the European market.

"If we compare our progress and also future plans in Europe and Asia, there are not many new destinations that we will open in Europe. We will most probably increase aircraft size so that we can have more volume," he said. "In Asia, we will go with basically opening one new destination per year.

"The key message is that 80 to 90 per cent of growth will come from Asia."

Finnair already generates about half its revenue from Asian routes, as measured by revenue passenger kilometres - a key metric for airlines that represents the number of kilometres flown multiplied by the number of passengers carried.