Japan's Vanilla Air now eyeing Okinawa as potential base

Vanilla Air (JW, Tokyo Narita) has revised its base operational plans for 2016 with Okinawa Naha now being touted as the location for the ANA - All Nippon Airways (NH, Tokyo Haneda) subsidiary's first base outside its Tokyo Narita hub.

According to the ZipanguFlyer blog, the LCC's is looking to serve more leisure-oriented markets such as Guam Int'l, Saipan, and the Philippines, including cities which have yet to be served by the ANA Group. It is also looking at entering the Chinese market to tap into Japan's largest source of inbound tourists.

To achieve such ends, the LCC is considering Okinawa as a secondary base while designating Taipei Taoyuan a strategic focus city.

In the longrun, ANA Holdings is looking to increase Vanilla Air's ASK capacity by 218% by the end of FY2020. It aims to develop the airline into the number one LCC at Narita, where it competes with sister firm Peach Aviation (MM, Osaka Kansai) and rival Jetstar Japan (GK, Tokyo Narita).