Chinese carrier Xiamen Airlines has indicated that it will introduce flights between the southeast coast Chinese seaport of Xiamen and the Amsterdam in the Netherlands this summer, its first route into Europe. The flight will strengthen links to the tourist city in the Fujian Province and operate alongside the existing KLM services on the route.

Although there have been rumours and suggestions about Xiamen Airlines expansion into Europe for the past year, this is the first confirmation from the carrier, a subsidiary of China Southern Airlines and member of the SkyTeam global alliance, that it does indeed intend to launch flights to Amsterdam this year.

The airline recently received permission from Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) to launch the route between Gaoqi International Airport in Xiamen and Amsterdam Schiphol, but has yet to open reservations while it waits for European aviation authorities approve the route.

Xiamen Airlines will utilise its new Boeing 787 Dreamliners on the link on an up to three times daily basis. The aircraft are configured in a three class arrangement with four First Class, 18 Business Class and 215 Economy seats and are currently used on the airline’s flights from Fuzhou and Xiamen to Beijing and Chengdu.

The new service will operate under a codeshare partnership with KLM, alongside the Dutch carrier’s flights on the route which were introduced on a three times weekly schedule in March 2011. KLM is the only airline to currently link Xiamen to Europe, one of five destinations it serves in mainland China from its Amsterdam Schiphol hub.

KLM offers 57 flights every week to Greater China together with its partner, China Southern Airlines and through its own and codeshare arrangements is the single largest supplier of air travel to China from Europe. Alongside links to Beijing, Shanghai, Xiamen, Hangzhou and Chengdu in mainland China it serves Hong Kong and Taipei in Taiwan, while China Southern operates to Guangzhou.

Xiamen is the second-largest city in the province of Fujian and has a population of three million inhabitants. Owing partly to its favourable geographical location, it is undergoing rapid economic growth, attracting large international corporations. The city is also a tourist destination with interesting cultural and historical highlights.

Ahead of the arrival of Xiamen Airlines on the route to Amsterdam, KLM and the City of Amsterdam have this week signed a memorandum of cooperation to strengthen collaboration and accessibility between the Netherlands and China.

The agreement was signed was signed by KLM president and chief executive officer, Pieter Elbers, Amsterdam mayor Eberhard van der Laan and Xiamen Airlines’ chief operating officer Zhao Dong.

“I’m pleased that signing this memorandum takes cooperation between KLM and Xiamen Airlines to an even higher level. In so doing, we’re able to offer our passengers an even broader range of choices. Together with our Chinese partners, we connect Europe and China directly, as well as offering shorter transfer options to secondary airports within China,” said Pieter Elbers.

In its almost five years of serving the Xiamen market, KLM has carried an estimated 255,000 bi-directional passengers on its flights to and from Amsterdam with annual figures exceeding 70,000 in 2012 and 2014.

In our analysis, below, we look in closer detail at the largest airlines operating between China and Europe over the past five years. KLM is currently the seventh largest carrier in this market, boosting its own passenger demand by 26.4 per cent across the period.