Romanians to fly low cost to Vienna with Niki Lauda's company

Low cost airline NIKI, founded by Formula 1 champion Niki Lauda, will operate on the Bucharest-Vienna route starting in February next year. The Austrian company thus fills a market void that was created after the bankruptcy of Sky Europe, which, in August, abandoned flights to Bucharest. "NIKI has been looking at development of the route to Bucharest for a few seasons now. As a matter of fact, despite the current economic downturn, we are sure that emerging markets such as Romania still have substantial growth potential in the long run. Whilst Western markets have matured, we feel there is a solid and growing demand in Central and Eastern European markets," Christian Lesjak, sales, marketing and planning manager of NIKI, told Ziarul Financiar exclusively. The company will operate an Airbus A320 aircraft from the Henri Coanda airport, with tickets to go on sale in October this year. "We plan to carry around 70,000 passengers on this route," Lesjak says. The price of a one-way ticket will be 29 euros, excluding fees.