British Airways Is Stoking The Business-Class Rivalry

WHENEVER an airline executive talks about trans-Atlantic business-class flying, I jump at the opportunity to ask, How much does it cost?

“It really depends,” said Woody Harford, the senior vice president for North American commercial operations of British Airways.

That’s what they all say — and for good reason. Trans-Atlantic business-class fares, which are the industry’s most profitable, already vary significantly, and they are about to become even more complicated as competition grows and demand holds up.

British Airways last week put down another bet on the resiliency of long-haul business class, saying it planned to start a new all-business-class route twice a day next year between London City Airport and either Kennedy or Newark airport.

The route will be flown using Airbus A318 planes configured with 32 lie-flat business-class seats. Usually, A318s are configured for 100 to 110 passengers, mostly in coach.

Two other things struck me as remarkable about the plan by British Airways, which already flies eight times a day between Kennedy and London Heathrow and three times a day between Newark and Heathrow.

One is the location: London City Airport. London City, which does not now have trans-Atlantic service, is six miles from the financial district and three miles from Canary Wharf, both home to rapidly growing international businesses.

Two is the audacity of the initial pricing. In recent years, three start-up all-business-class carriers — Eos and Silverjet (along with MaxJet, which is now defunct) — began offering New York-to-London business-class fares that were considerably lower than the major carriers. According to Mr. Harford, the new British Airways business-class service will charge the same as its existing business-class service, known as Club World, between New York and Heathrow.

“You can assume it’s going to be within the absolutely same neighborhood,” he said.

On the other hand, as several competitors pointed out, little London City Airport has strict take-off weight limits. So the westbound flights of the new service will need to make what a British Airways spokesman conceded will be a “quick 40-minute gas-and-go stop” for a full load of fuel at an airport in western Britain or Ireland before proceeding across the Atlantic.

Back to the fares. If you plan to fly between New York and London on short notice, the business-class walk-up fares are bracing. On British Airways, if you booked Monday to fly to Heathrow on Wednesday and return Saturday, you would pay $10,658.37. On American Airlines, the fare for the same dates is $8,611.40 — in the same ballpark as the fare charged by Eos. American flies six times a day between New York and Heathrow, but started a new route with competitive fares to Stansted last year in response to Eos and MaxJet.

On Silverjet, which flies between Newark and the farther-out London Luton Airport, the fare is $3,260.

Some high-volume companies negotiate discounts of 40 percent or more. For others, buying a ticket well in advance brings the fare down considerably.

British Airways, which is counting on its brand recognition as it takes on smaller rivals, also plans to start a separate small all-business-class airline called OpenSkies in the spring, flying between New York and cities in Europe other than London. Last week, British Airways reported a 28.5 percent jump in operating profit for the last nine months, “mainly due to more premium passengers traveling.”

The intensifying free-for-all in business-class cabins over the Atlantic is likely to rattle the foundations of the existing fares this year as competition grows, Mr. Harford said.

The kind of intense yield-management that slices and dices coach cabins into a wide range of fares, depending on projected demand, will come to the business-class cabins across the Atlantic, he predicted. “As you get more competition and more options, as more advance-purchase opportunities creep in, a lot of the complexities of the fares in the economy cabins is creeping into the business cabin,” he said. “I think what you’ll see over the next few months is a lot more pricing options available.”

E-mail: jsharkey@nytimes.com

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