Airline Alliances and Partnerships

Alliances help us at personal as well as professional levels. This is kind of important for airlines too. The more the friends an airline has, the more benefits it gets. 

There are three major airlines at this moment namely, Star Alliance, SkyTeam and One World. The main benefit of having an alliance is that sharing of resources, which effectively bring down the cost of operation. Plus, the alliances also help them to forward passenger to routes using partner airline routes where it does not operate its own flights. This is definitely a win, because, despite not serving a destination an airline can still service the passenger thus, improving the load factor. Certainly a win.

Eg. When some one want to fly between Toronto and Delhi, a passenger realizes that there is apparently no direct flight,

BUT,

There is choice, Air Canada and Air India are members of star alliances, which means, the passenger can fly between Toronto and London on an Air Canada flight and then fly between London and Delhi by an Air India flight. An onward connection is also possible further.

For frequent flyers there is another plus, where miles can consumed and gained even while flying on partner airlines. This in turn makes the customers loyal to a particular alliance

Members of the alliances are as follows: 

Star Alliance: Adria Airways, Aegean Airlines, Air Canada, Air China, Air India, Air New Zealand, All Nippon Airways, Asiana Airlines, Austrian Airlines, Avianca Holdings, Brussels Airlines, Copa Airlines, Croatia Airlines, EgyptAir, Ethiopian Airlines, EVA Air, LOT Polish Airlines, Lufthansa, Scandinavian Airlines, Shenzhen Airlines, Singapore Airlines, South African Airways, Swiss International Air Lines, TAP Portugal, Thai Airways International, Turkish Airlines and United Airlines

SkyTeam: Aeroflot, Aerolíneas Argentinas, Aeroméxico, Air Europa, Air France, Alitalia, China Airlines, China Eastern Airlines, China Southern Airlines, Czech Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Garuda Indonesia, Kenya Airways, KLM, Korean Air, Middle East Airlines, Saudia, TAROM, Vietnam Airlines and Xiamen Airlines.

OneWorld: Air Berlin, American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Finnair, Iberia, Japan Airlines, LAN Airlines, Malaysia Airlines, Qantas, Qatar Airways, Royal Jordanian, S7 Airlines, TAM Airlines, SriLankan Airlines and US Airways.