West Air on 5 February launched its first ever international service, from Chongqing (CKG) to Singapore

The Chinese carrier will serve the 3,164-kilometre route thrice-weekly with its 180-seat A320s. The route is already served by SilkAir with five weekly flights. Flights depart the carrier’s home base at 18:35 arriving in Singapore at 23:35. Return flights leave Changi Airport at 00:35 before landing in Chongqing at 05:05. With 32 city links to China, Singapore is well-connected to the country. In 2015, China continued to be a key market for Changi Airport, with 4.9 million passenger movements for the sector. Contributing about 9% to Changi’s total passenger traffic, China is the airport’s fifth-largest passenger source market. With West Air’s entrance, there are 12 airlines at Changi Airport operating direct services to China, offering some 560 weekly flights between the two countries. According to ch-aviation, West Air operates a fleet of 22 narrow-body Airbus aircraft. It is a subsidiary of Lucky Air, which in turn, is a subsidiary of Hainan Airlines.

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China's West Air to commence LCC operations on March 29

West Air  will join rival China United Airlines (KN, Beijing Nanyuan) in commencing low-cost operations on March 29. The Hainan Airlines (HU, Haikou) subsidiary, which began its transformation from a mainstream operation into an LCC in May 2013, will use its revised business model to better position itself in the Western China market.

West Air Vice President Cen Jianjun told China's WCARN news portal that with a 10% reduction in operating costs, his carrier's revised airfares are now, on average, 20% lower than those of traditional network airlines.

An all-Airbus Industrie (AIB, Toulouse Blagnac) operator with four A319-100s and thirteen A320-200s on its books, West Air plans to grow its fleet to over 100 aircraft come 2020. 

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