German bus Flixbus giant today, 25 July, announced the beginning of regular flights to four Ukrainian cities. First bus leaves from Prague to Ukraine on Thursday, July 27, writes Deutsche Welle.
Among Ukrainian cities, which will serve the carrier – Lviv, Rivne, Zhytomyr and Kyiv. The ticket to Prague on the website of the German company worth about 730 UAH (25 Euro). In Wroclaw – 560 (less 20€) in Krakow – 580 UAH (20 Euro).
Flixbus planned to enter the Ukrainian market before the visa-free regime Ukraine – EU entered into force, however, bizviz also played a role, says Nikolay Voytyuk, Vice President, Flixbus Eastern Europe.
“In any case we had planned to bring Ukraine to our European network. The decision to go to Ukraine was not concerned visa-free regime for Ukrainian citizens. However, in the present situation we tried to make it as fast as possible,” said Voytyuk.
Transportation to and from Ukraine to exercise and Flixbus partners – the Czech company Umbrella. This is a typical order for this to work Flixbus, because the company cooperates with more than 250 regional partners-carriers which have a common ticketing system and the overall brand.
Voytyuk also explained why among the proposed at the moment directions is no direct communication of Ukrainian cities with Germany. Flixbus aim first to include key Ukrainian cities to the pan-European network. At the same time, Voytyuk noted that Flixbus will not be limited to the existing grid of flights: “We are looking at which cities are suitable for connection to our network. Next year we plan to expand and connect more than four cities, which are now”.
The former Deputy head of the Minister of infrastructure Oleksandr Kava is optimistic but restrained expectations for the arrival of the new carrier.
“Now the market competition is quite large, but the way the company operates under the brand Flixbus – definitely a plus, because the more carriers we will have to work on, the more competition, the lower will be the prices, – the expert explains. After the liberalization of the visa regime between Ukraine and the EU transport demand increase, experts predict.
Flixbus is not the first company with EU, became interested in the Ukrainian market. From October 2016 the Polish carrier Operators, which is another partnership, a Polish company, Ideal Travel, operates flights to seven cities: Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Chernivtsi, Ternopil, Vinnytsia, Khmelnytsky and Kherson. The ticket from Krakow to Lviv costs about 20 euros. In Wroclaw – 25 euros. But Polskibus to Prague goes from Ukraine.
As you know, Flixbus works in the transport market since 2013 and during the work managed to absorb several other major carriers, among them in particular, Megabus, and the Austrian Postbus HELLÖ. According to the Welt, Flixbus controls 87 percent of the bus transportation market in Germany. The company carries out 200 thousand daily flights 1 200 cities in 24 countries.
