Perth Qantas flights to Asia scaled back Qantas services out of Perth to Asian hubs Singapore and Hong Kong have been cut back Source: The Australian QANTAS is taking advantage of the growing Asian market, with plans for new routes to China and India plus extra flights to key regional hubs. The airline, whose international operations have been struggling with hefty losses, unveiled its much-anticipated Asia strategy which builds on its planned tie-up with Emirates. Under the plan, Qantas wants to increase flights and capacity to Singapore and Hong Kong and expand its network within Asia through local partners such as Japan Airlines, Cathay Pacific and Malaysia Airlines. Qantas is also investigating increasing the number of cities it flies to across Asia, with Beijing, Seoul, Mumbai, Delhi and Tokyo-Haneda under consideration. However, the airline will reduce its Perth-Singapore services to one a day and cease its Adelaide-Singapore and Perth-Hong Kong flights. Qantas has also brought forward the end of its loss-making Frankfurt service by six months to April 15. Qantas International chief executive Simon Hickey said the airline's first step was to restructure existing services to Asia that were no longer tied to onward links to Europe. "The number of dedicated seats on Qantas services to Hong Kong and Singapore is increasing significantly, because capacity previously set aside for customers going to Europe via these hubs can be freed up," he said. Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation managing director Peter Harbison said the changes were logical and taking advantage of Jetstar's penetration into the Asian market. It also made sense for Qantas to focus on Asia and take advantage of the rapidly growing demand for flights to and from Australia. "There is certainly much more growth in the Asian markets (than Europe)," he said. China alone had 500,000 in bound tourists this year and a million by 2020. You're talking about enormous traffic flows. Mr Harbison said Qantas had flown to all of the proposed new destinations at some time in the past but they had proven unviable with the large 747s. However, he said the airline's smaller and more fuel efficient 787s would make those routes more profitable. "They've been very marginal to operate with the only aircraft to get there the large 747s and operationally it wasn't possible to fly non stop from the Australian east coast to Mumbai and Delhi so the 787's make that possible," he said.