Company profile
SunExpress has been your Turkey specialist since 20 years
Foundation
SunExpress was founded in October 1989 as a subsidiary company of Lufthansa and Turkish Airlines. Today SunExpress is the market leader in charter flights between Germany and Turkey as well as one of the largest scheduled carriers between Europe and southern Turkey.
Employees
With 644 employees the company is the largest employer in Antalya. SunExpress counts 251 employees in Izmir, 131 in Istanbul and 30 in Frankfurt. The total SunExpress workforce numbers 1,056.
The parent companies
Connections with Lufthansa
SunExpress cooperates with Lufthansa to offer scheduled flights from Antalya and Izmir to the most important destinations across Europe. Thus, passengers can fly to London, Paris, Brussels, Madrid, Milan, Amsterdam, Zurich, Copenhagen, Oslo, Stockholm, Warsaw, Moscow, Prague and Helsinki by transferring to Lufthansa connecting flights in Frankfurt and Munich. Additionally, Munich, Berlin, Cologne, Hamburg, Bremen, Dusseldorf, Stuttgart, Leipzig, Nuremberg, Dresden, Hanover and Muenster are among the destinations in Germany that can be reached comfortably with Lufthansa and SunExpress.
Code-share flights with Turkish Airlines
All flights within Turkey as well as the international connections from Istanbul Sabiha Gökcen Airport and Izmir are operated as code-shares in cooperation with Turkish Airlines. SunExpress reserves certain seat quotas for Turkish Airlines. Seats on these flights can be booked on the Turkish Airlines website or by travel agencies cooperating with the carrier.
Flight schedule
International scheduled flights
SunExpress launched regular daily connections between Frankfurt and Antalya in 2001, thus becoming the first private Turkish airline to offer international scheduled flights. The timetable of scheduled services was expanded in 2005 with numerous flights to and from Izmir and in 2008 with flights to and from Istanbul.
In summer 2009 SunExpress offers international connections on the routes from Antalya to Amsterdam, Basel, Berlin, Bremen, Cologne, Dortmund, Dresden, Dusseldorf, Erfurt, Frankfurt, Friedrichshafen, Graz, Hamburg, Hanover, Karlsruhe, Leipzig, Linz, Muenster, Munich, Nuremberg, Paderborn, Rostock-Laage, Saarbrücken, Salzburg, Stuttgart, Vienna, Weeze and Zurich. SunExpress also flies from Izmir to Amsterdam, Berlin, Cologne, Dusseldorf, Frankfurt, Hanover, Munich, Nuremberg, Stuttgart, Vienna and Zurich. Additionally, SunExpress operates flights from Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen to Amsterdam, Berlin, Cologne, Frankfurt, Hanover and Munich.
Domestic services
Since March 2006 SunExpress has also linked Izmir, Turkey’s third-largest city, with the most important cities in Asia Minor by offering domestic flights. This is a novelty in intra-Turkish services which is centered on the hubs in Istanbul and Ankara.
These direct flights which SunExpress operates from Izmir, Istanbul Sabiha Gökcen Airport and Antalya achieved high seat-load factors within short periods. This demonstrates that many Turkish cities hold a significant passenger potential.
In summer 2009 the company flies from Izmir to Antalya, Adana, Diyarbakir, Erzurum, Gaziantep, Kars, Kayseri, Malatya, Samsun, Sivas, Trabzon and Van. Additionally, the airline links Antalya with Adana, Bursa, Diyarbakir, Erzurum, Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen, Izmir, Samsun, Trabzon and Van. From Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen, SunExpress flies to Adana, Antalya, Diyarbakir, Erzurum, Kars, Samsun, Sivas, Trabzon and Van. Furthermore, SunExpress offers services between Bursa and Antalya, between Erzurum and Trabzon, and from Adana to Erzurum and Trabzon.
Reservations
SunExpress uses electronic tickets and offers online tickets via its website www.sunexpress.com. Furthermore, SunExpress tickets can be booked in Turkey through the Call Center by dialing 444 0 797, at Turkish Airlines and in travel agencies. In Germany, SunExpress can also be booked in travel agencies, from tour operating partners and via the Internet portal. By telephone the SunExpress Service Center can be reached from Germany on 01805 – 95 95 90 (0.14 EUR per minute from a German landline; mobile phone charges in Germany max. 0,42 EUR per minute), from Austria on 0820 – 89 87 97 (0.20 EUR per minute) and from Switzerland on 0900 – 444 797 (0.36 CHF per minute). In the Netherlands, ticket sales are handled by travel agencies.
As a rule, SunExpress advertises ticket prices that include all taxes and fees. Thus, the final price is transparent and customer-friendly.
Market shares
Since its foundation, SunExpress has carried about 18 million passengers on more than 155,000 flights. In Antalya SunExpress is the market leader with a 12-percent share of passenger volumes. In Izmir the airline is the number one in international traffic with a share of 32 percent despite the fact that operations there began as recently as in 2005. The number of passengers increased to more than 4 million in 2008, an increase of 33 percent to the year before. The company achieved record results during the first 11 months of 2008: Revenues increased significantly to 380 million euros (+33 percent) and the number of block hours performed reached 71,608 (+32 percent).
Our responsibilty
Certificates
SunExpress is certified according to ISO 9001 (quality management), ISO 14001 (environmental management) and OHSAS 18001. In addition, SunExpress holds an IOSA registration with IATA (high safety standards), and its internal processes have been audited by an international system to assess airlines’ organizational processes and management systems. These process-oriented management systems are applied throughout the company and controlled by professional quality management.
