Virgin Atlantic Cancels Shanghai Flights, Gives Up On Far East

Virgin Atlantic will soon be canceling its only route to China, and I can’t help but feel like this kind of reflects the bigger issue with Virgin Atlantic’s business model, and how the airline is at this point basically operating as a subsidiary of Delta.

Virgin Atlantic cancels London to Shanghai route

As of October 26, 2024, Virgin Atlantic will be discontinuing its route between London (LHR) and Shanghai (PVG). For context, the flight currently operates daily with a Boeing 787-9, with the following schedule:

VS250 London to Shanghai departing 12:35PM arriving 8:20AM (+1 day)
VS251 Shanghai to London departing 11:10AM arriving 6:50PM

The 5,754-mile flight is blocked at 12hr45min eastbound and 14hr40min westbound.

This is a route that Virgin Atlantic launched back in 1999, so the company has a lot of history in the market. The airline suspended the route at the start of the pandemic, and then restarted it again as of May 2023. It’s not lasting long, though, as it’ll be gone by October 2024. Other airlines operating in this market include British Airways and China Eastern.

This is significant, because Shanghai was Virgin Atlantic’s last destination in the Far East. The airline also used to fly to Hong Kong (HKG) and Tokyo Narita (NRT), but those routes were already terminated in the past.

Virgin Atlantic’s challenging business model

I can’t say I’m surprised to see Virgin Atlantic cutting Shanghai flights. For one, Virgin Atlantic is at a disadvantage compared to China Eastern in terms of the distance it has to fly, in order to avoid Russian airspace. Furthermore, China demand just hasn’t come back after the pandemic, and a lot of airlines are struggling with China service.

However, symbolically I can’t help but point out how significant it is that Virgin Atlantic is pulling out of the Far East, as the SkyTeam carrier’s “world” keeps getting smaller. It points to a bigger issue with Virgin Atlantic’s business, which is that being an exclusively long haul carrier isn’t terribly lucrative, as you need feeder traffic.

Keep in mind that Delta owns a 49% stake in Virgin Atlantic, and at this point Virgin Atlantic essentially seems to be reduced to an airline that’s focused around serving Delta’s network.

Virgin Atlantic operates a lot of routes across the Atlantic as part of its joint venture with Delta, where the airlines have revenue sharing, and Virgin Atlantic has a better cost structure (in part due to lower labor costs).

Most of the carrier’s other routes have both a good bit of local UK demand, plus demand from people connecting across the Atlantic. That includes destinations like India and South Africa. The only routes that Delta really has no part in is Virgin Atlantic’s Caribbean service, which is of course a smart way to fill planes counter seasonally.

It’s interesting to reflect on how Virgin Atlantic seemingly can’t make anything else work. Virgin Atlantic was going to launch Sao Paulo (GRU) flights, but has now canceled the route twice prior to launch.

The irony of course is that Delta is the world’s most profitable airline. So you’d think that Delta having such a controlling stake in Virgin Atlantic, plus partnering so closely with the airline, would lead to profitability. But that’s not the case, as Virgin Atlantic continues to lose money, even as other long haul airlines reported record profits last year.

Bottom line

As of late October 2024, Virgin Atlantic will be discontinuing flights between London and Shanghai. This was the carrier’s last remaining route to the Far East, as the airline previously terminated Hong Kong and Tokyo flights.

While I can’t say I’m surprised by this particular cut, it’s sad how Virgin Atlantic has essentially been reduced to a Delta subsidiary. Then again, I’m not sure there’s a better business case for the airline.

What do you make of Virgin Atlantic ending Shanghai flights?