Malaysia budget airline AirAsia Group Bhd announced on Thursday it has partnered with more airlines to sell their flights on its Super App, part of its move to become an online travel agency that also offers competitors’ flights and hotel bookings.

Some of its newest airline partners are Air Canada, Air France, Air Mauritius, Bamboo Airways, Ethiopian Airlines, flydubai, Go First, KLM, Mahan Air, Qatar Airways, Turkish Airlines, Philippine Airlines, US Bangla Airlines, and others, AirAsia said in a statement.

Its hotel partnerships have also continued to grow with over 300,000 hotels now available on the super app.

The super app continues to expand its flight and hotel offerings by partnering with more than 700 international airline brands flying to over 3,000 destinations and promoting thousands of hotels worldwide.

With these expanding collaborations, its airasia Super App users can now secure great value travel deals to many destinations outside of AirAsia’s network, including across Europe, Oceania, Africa, the Middle East, and the Americas, the aviation group said.

“In just over two years, we are now one of the top three leading online travel agencies (OTAs) in ASEAN based on website traffic, with over 100 million average page views monthly. What gives us a unique advantage is the fact we are the only OTA that also owns an airline, which has allowed us to leverage our experience with flights to ensure the lowest prices guaranteed on many select offerings. We also have access to a wealth of big and rich travel data, as we have always been a digitally-driven business since day one, 20 years ago,” airasia Super App Chief Executive Officer Amanda Woo.

Through the collaborations, AirAsia will offer travel deals to more destinations outside its network across Europe, Oceania, Africa, the Middle East, and the Americas.

AirAsia will compete with online travel platforms such as Agoda, Expedia and Indonesia-based Traveloka. AirAsia’s move to partner with more airlines and sell more flights on its super app comes as Malaysia and other countries in Southeast Asia are beginning to reopen their economies and tourism sector to welcome back tourists.

Malaysia announced on Monday it will reopen Langkawi island to overseas visitors beginning November 15, under a pilot international tourism bubble project. Neighboring Singapore said Tuesday it will allow quarantine-free entry to travelers vaccinated against COVID-19 from Australia and Switzerland from Nov 8. Last week, Thailand announced it will let vaccinated visitors from 46 countries forgo COVID-19 quarantine from next month, up from 10 previously announced.

In November 2019, AirAsia has expanded its online offering to include flights on other airlines as it transformed airasia.com into Asia Pacific’s travel and lifestyle platform in partnership with leading travel technology company Kiwi.com. In November 2020, The Super App announced a partnership with Turkish Airlines.

AirAsia super app, which provides services from flight booking, food delivery, e-commerce to e-hailing services, has a market value of around $1 billion, according to a share-swap deal with Gojek in July.

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Featured image credit: AirAsia