Hungarian low cost airline Wizz Air will increase its passenger transport capacity in Romania by 29% in 2015 compared to 2014, by adding new airplanes, a new airport and new routes, as well as by increasing the frequency of its flights on the most popular routes, the company’s representatives announced.

“Today we mark another important step for Wizz Air in Romania. In just two months we announced three new airplanes for our bases in the country, a new airport, 20 new routes and 1.35 million additional seats for 2015,” said John Stephenson, executive vice-president of Wizz Air.

“The continuous expansion of the Wizz network and the increased frequencies on existing routes will definitely attract more passengers, either tourists or business travelers. This growth will also support adding more than 1,000 new jobs in Romania and will boost local tourism,” he added.

Wizz Air will allot a new airplane to its base in Bucharest, the ninth, which should be delivered at the end of July 2015. Its whole fleet in Romania will reach 17 Airbus A 320 airplanes.

The company will also start operating flights from the airport in Iasi, thus reaching 8 airports it serves in Romania. Wizz Air will have flights from Iasi to Treviso, starting December 20 this year, to Milan, starting March 31, 2015, and to London, starting June 14, 2014.

Wizz Air also launched new routes from Bucharest to Pescara (Italy) and Stockholm (Sweden), starting the end of July 2015, and summer flights to Heraklion in Crete (Greece). With these new routes, Wizz Air will reach 97 routes in total, to 15 countries.

The company will also increase the frequency of its flights on the busiest routes. For example, flights from Cluj-Napoca to London will increase from 9 a week to 11 a week. And flights from Bucharest to Milan, Treviso and Brussels will also increase from 7 a week to 11 a week.

Wizz clients can already purchase tickets for the new routes and the summer 2015 timetable for Wizz Air flights from Romania is already available.

In 2013, Wizz Air transported about 3.2 million passengers to and from Romania, 14% more than in the previous year. The total number of passengers transported by Wizz Air last year was 13.9 million, which makes it the largest low cost airline in Central and Eastern Europe.

Andrei Chirileasa,andrei@romania-insider.com