For the summer season, the Latvian national airline airBaltic will launch seven new routes for Finland, and two new routes from Tallinn, as part of the airline’s expansion strategy in Finland and Estonia.

Bertolt Flick, President and CEO of airBaltic: “Finland and Estonia are important markets for airBaltic. With Riga airport having exceeded its designed capacity limits, we are expanding in airBaltic’s key markets. We clearly see that Finland and Estonia are underserved. Offering more direct flights from Tallinn, Estonia, is a strategic step for airBaltic.”

In addition to the new routes, airBaltic will improve its offer for the Finnish customers by increasing to daily flights on the Lappeenranta-Riga route, and securing seven times daily service on the Helsinki-Riga route during the summer season. A full schedule of airBaltic flights can be found on the company’s homepage at www.airbaltic.com

The new routes in Finland are launched at the same time with opening a Finnish-language website www.airbaltic.com that offers affordable and convenient flights, travel packages (flights +hotels), and a wide range of other products and services.

For 2009 airBaltic has announced 20 million EUR preliminary profit, and achieved 6% passenger growth to 2.75 million passengers. In 2010, airBaltic will open at least nine new direct routes from Riga, and has so far announced new destinations including Madrid, Belgrade, Vaasa, Umea, Beirut, Amman, Manchester, Rovaniemi, Kuusamo. The number of direct routes from Vilnius, announced by airBaltic over the past month, already total 10 – London, Paris, Munich, Berlin, Amsterdam, Rome, Hamburg, Manchester, Dublin, and Oslo.

Regardless of the point of departure, airBaltic offers convenient connections over its North Hub Riga to the airline’s network in Europe, Scandinavia, Russia, CIS and the Middle East.