Kenya Airways (KQ, Nairobi Jomo Kenyatta) is considering partnering with SAA Technical (SAAT), the maintenance arm of South African Airways, according to Group Managing Director and CEO Alan Kiravuka. It is said that they are doing so.
In an interview with Aviation Week, Kiravuka revealed that he sees an opportunity to collaborate with SAA on MRO services with the aim of expanding Kenya Airways’ maintenance capabilities and potentially making it an independent business unit. did.
He said about 65% of Kenya Airways’ in-house MRO department currently handles the airline’s own maintenance needs, with third-party airlines accounting for about 15%. The unit services aircraft from airlines such as LAM – Linhas Aéreas de Moçambique, Rwanda Air and Kenya’s Astral Aviation. Kilavuka believes it has the potential to further expand these services by partnering with SAA, which has spare capacity and skilled personnel.
“On the support side, we are sharing information. We want to go a step further and look at their technology (business) because they have a very good technology department.” he said. “They have the tools and the people to help us really scale. We have the ability to grow, but we need the tools and space and more people to grow. So if we work with South African Airways, we are not working with them at the moment.”
He added that diversification is one of the key pillars of Kenya Airways’ business sustainability. “Diversification has various pillars and various trends. The first pillar is the growth of MRO,” he said.
In a recent webinar, SAA Technical CEO Wellington Nyuswa also expressed interest in such collaborations, noting that SAA’s third-party operations capabilities have expanded following fleet reductions since COVID-19. “Look at SAA and Kenya (aviation), for example. That cooperation is one of the many that we actually need,” he said.
Since 2021, Kenya Airways has been pursuing broader strategic partnerships with SAA and other African airlines in the form of the Pan-African Union. Kenya Airways and SAA signed a strategic partnership framework in November of the same year, but the initiative stalled after the pandemic. restructuring. Kiravka hopes to quickly resume strategic partnership negotiations with SAA or develop strategic cooperation with another African airline by 2027. Both airlines have recently returned to profitability, and both plan to bring in equity partners to fund fleet upgrades and growth.
