The launch of a new operational base at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands 19 years after it first launched flights to the European gateway will enable easyJet to enhance its business offering from the city through more early morning departures. The carrier will station three Airbus A320s at the airport from spring 2015 and launch six new international routes to European destinations.

Amsterdam is already one of easyJet’s most successful network points with more than 3.5 million passengers flying annually to and from 21 destinations. It revealed earlier this year its plans to open a base at Schiphol Airport to further strengthen the airline’s long-term strategic position at the airport, where it now holds a nine per cent market share having first introduced flights back in 1996.

The launch of its summer 2015 schedule now provides more details of its plans from Amsterdam including the addition of new links to Dubrovnik (twice weekly), Nice (daily), Olbia (twice weekly), Toulouse (three times weekly) and Venice (daily) to the previously announced plan to introduce a six times weekly flight to Hamburg from next month.

In total, easyJet will now connect passengers in the Netherlands to 25 destinations with the new routes complementing its existing schedule by strengthening city-to-city connections with additional frequencies on popular routes to Basel, Berlin, Bordeaux, Bristol and London.

The arrival of two A320s at the end of March 2015 and a third in May 2015 will increase capacity on routes that are now served with the A319. With based aircraft easyJet will be able to provide a new daily early morning departure to Geneva, in addition to its existing early slot to London Gatwick. With this extra capacity easyJet expects to fly an additional 600,000 passengers next year, an incremental 16 per cent year-on-year increase with total capacity in Amsterdam growing to 4.7 million seats a year.

The summer 2015 schedule will see easyJet boost its links between the Netherlands and the UK offering 154 flights each way per week between the two countries – with 108 each way between Amsterdam and London each week. This equates to around 15 flights per day with the introduction of an additional daily flight between Amsterdam and London Gatwick and two extra frequencies a week to and from Bristol. However, it appears the carrier will end its current Amsterdam – Newcastle flight in May 2015 after less than three years of operation.

“easyJet will bring a balanced and mature offering to the Netherlands. This will grow in line with our passenger needs. Basing three aircraft in the Netherlands will bring more choice for Dutch passengers and lower fares. It will also help boost local tourism and economic growth with the creation of hundreds of jobs and increased passenger numbers,” said William Vet, easyJet’s Commercial Manager for the Netherlands.

According to statistics from easyJet, around one million business travellers already fly with the carrier to and from Schiphol, around one third of its total number of passengers. In our analysis, below, we look at easyJet’s annual capacity at Amsterdam Schiphol over the past ten years. The data from OAG Schedules Analyser shows that the airline’s capacity at the Netherlands gateway declined by 1.2 per cent in 2013 but was its second highest level on record. The small decline followed three years of double-digit growth with capacity up 33.4 per cent in 2010, 21.8 per cent in 2011 and 10.1 per cent in 2012.

Data provided by