Its senior vice-president for commercial group, David A. Lim, said the flight resumption between both capitals was in line with the carrier’s route expansion and flight modernisation.
“We are looking to not only ‘selling’ Manila to Malaysian travellers but also the Philippines as a whole and the Americas, as well as the Oceania routes,” he told reporters after announcing the Manila-Kuala Lumpur route on Wednesday.
Present were Philippine Airlines vice president of sales Ryan T. Uy and Pacific World Travel Sdn Bhd president Tunku Datuk Seri Iskandar Tunku Abdullah.
Pacific World Travel is a general sales agent for Philippine Airlines Malaysia.
“We have expanded eight new destinations this year and we will expand more as we move towards the year-end,” Lim said.
To date, Philippine Airlines has 29 domestic flights and 44 international destinations, including that of the Middle East and Europe.
He noted that the reopening of the route was also aimed at capitalising on the Asean economic integration as it would provide direct access to new business opportunities.
Lim expressed confidence that the airline would regain its market share in Malaysia as it planned to expand its code-share partnership with Malaysia Airlines in domestic flights.
The carrier halted its flights to Kuala Lumpur in 2014 after a year in operation partly due to microeconomic factors, said Uy.
He said 2013 was a challenging year for everyone due to high fuel prices.
“That was part of the reasons why we stopped the route. We believe this is the best time to come in, especially with Asean celebrating its 50th anniversary, to grow our tourism industry,” he added.