US flights not on Cebu Pacific’s radar yet

MANILA, Philippines — Budget carrier Cebu Pacific is not looking to fly to the US anytime soon after it stops its Guam operations in December, saying that it would instead add more frequencies to existing services.

“It’s not going to be new routes (that will replace Guam), but additional frequencies to existing services. So it’s additional frequencies, I think we’re looking at Macau,” Cebu Pacific vice president for marketing and distribution Candice Iyog said.

Iyog said Cebu Pacific would stop its operations in Guam to further optimize its slots.
“The slots are a very viable resource so, while Guam was relatively profitable, it’s about now making sure that we utilize a limited resource for a route that there is higher demand for and add more frequencies for routes where there are more passengers. So it’s really more driven by that,” she said.

Guam is the first and only US territory to which Cebu Pacific flies to. It started its Manila-Guam route in March 2016.

Iyog said the Gokongwei-owned carrier is not looking at flying into other US destinations at the moment.

“Right now the focus is on all our existing dots in the network and where it makes sense to connect.dots that have not been connected before and add frequencies to existing services,” she said.

Early this month, Cebu Pacific launched direct flights from Manila to Shenzhen, its fifth destination in mainland China and the airline’s 27th international destination.

Iyog said the carrier would also start three new routes from Clark next month, which include direct flights to Narita in Japan.

The official said Cebu Pacific is on track of hitting its 200-millionth passenger mark by 2020 and looks at reaching the 300 million milestone by 2022.