What's your take on today's Virgin Australia results and announcements?

Virgin Australia has opened the books on the July-December 2016 financial period, and while the airline reported $42.3 million in pre-tax profit, that was almost half of the $81.5 million pre-tax profit in July-December 2015 while associated costs including restructuring charges and 'fleet simplification' sunk this to an overall loss of $A21.5 million.

Hopefully Brisbane will get the Beijing flight; it would be the most sensible for VA considering no one already serves it!

My sources at Virgin told me a different port to HK, being Sydney. Though this news is a few months old..

Another snippet from this morning: with regard to inflight Internet, Virgin Australia CEO John Borghetti says the airline is “planning a big announcement very shortly."

I'm still disappointed they are getting rid of the E190 jets. They are great for short trips around the east coast and are so much more comfortable in economy. Will those last 5 737s just make up for the E190 loss?

When connecting to HKG or PEK, would VA link its membership scheme with HNA's, or at least provide some benefits to its members in HNA's network?

Virgin swung to a net loss of $21.5 million in the December half, including the impact of restructuring costs, compared with a net profit of $62.5 million a year earlier.

Underlying profit before tax was $42.3 million, down $39.2 million. Virgin earlier this month posted a 37 per cent fall in second-quarter underlying earnings.

A stagnant business going nowhere, it is losing market share as a total in the domestic market and lacks depth and volume in its business.  It is very poor in regional Australia so lacks the feed that QF enjoys through its network, in Townsville for example it is now down to 22% pax as a total , many other regional centres are not much better. The anti QF sentiment it enjoyed for a period has gone and now it has been found wanting in the real things passengers want, flights schedule, route options and connections. It really lacks a defined focus and now lacks the capital to address many of its shortcomings. The only way it can succeed is to return its focus on its domestic service where it enjoys some protection from competition through govt legislation and rely on its partners for international options. 

My view on VA has always been and still remains the same today....it does not know what it stands for. I honestly think it's never been able to shake its low cost carrier heritage. It's essentially become some kind of hybrid airline, reliant on virtual networks and a half in / half out domestic offering. It's clear that their strategy is simply not working, and change at the top is needed. 

Originally Posted by E63AMG :

The significant change after connecting to hkg is that VA will be integrated into hna's network. Hna has been running 8 flight from Australia to destinations in China : (Mel + Syd) x (Xi'an+Changsha) x 2. The hkg route can then connect VA to hna's international and intercontinental routes based at hkg. The integration will make the access to ne Asia market feasible -- Singapore is too far and sq has too few destinations in this region. Actually, this will be the first time when an Australia based airline can go deep into China because China doesn't have a Oneworld member. 

Virgin's results are rather sad; they're a good airline and competition is healthy for the aviation market. 

I honestly don't know how Virgin can 'fix' themselves but I do think an obvious problem they have, and even they recognize having it, is that they have an excessively complicated fleet.