Syphax Airlines was a scheduled airline with its head office and main base at

Sfax–Thyna International Airport Sfax–Thyna International Airport (french: link=no, Aéroport International de Sfax–Thyna, ar, مطار صفاقس الدولي) is an airport serving Sfax in Tunisia. The airport is located 6 kilometers (4 miles) southwest from Sfax. Histo ...

Sfax Sfax (; ar, صفاقس, Ṣafāqis ) is a city in Tunisia, located southeast of Tunis. The city, founded in AD849 on the ruins of Berber Taparura, is the capital of the Sfax Governorate (about 955,421 inhabitants in 2014), and a Mediterrane ...

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. It served destinations in the Mediterranean.

History

The airline was incorporated as a limited company in 2011 by businessman Mohamed Frikha, Founder and CEO of Telnet, with a capital of 10 million dinars ($6.3m). Originally the airline planned to operate services only from Sfax, but the Tunisian aviation authorities gave them permission to fly from all airports in Tunisia. The first scheduled services were launched on 29 April 2012 using two Airbus A319 aircraft. Despite growth in services and passenger numbers the airline had after-tax losses of 14.53m dinars ($9.2m) in the first year of operation. In December 2012, an Airbus A330-200 lease contract was announced and the aircraft delivered in June 2013, eventually operating services to

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple- ...

. These widebody operations came to an end in 2015 with the return of the aircraft to its lessor. On 15 January 2013 the airline ordered 3 Airbus A320neo and 3 A320ceo narrowbody aircraft, at a list price of some $600m and with delivery starting in 2015. These orders were cancelled in June and August 2015 respectively due to the airline's deteriorating financial situation. In July 2015, Syphax Airlines suspended all operations stating financial difficulties. However, the airline announced a resumption of services by September 2015 after sourcing new funding. In September 2018, it was announced the airline would restart operations in Spring 2019. Initially, the carrier would offer its two ex-

Air Nostrum Air Nostrum, legally incorporated as ''Air Nostrum Líneas Aéreas del Mediterráneo, S.A.'', is a Spanish regional airline based in Valencia. It currently operates as a franchisee of Iberia as Iberia Regional and an affiliate member of the On ...

CRJ900ERs for wet-lease services during the Winter 2018/19 season, ahead of the launch of its own routes in March or April 2019. The carrier intends to connect

Tunis ''Tounsi'' french: Tunisois , population_note = , population_urban = , population_metro = 2658816 , population_density_km2 = , timezone1 = CET , utc_offset1 ...

Djerba Djerba (; ar, جربة, Jirba, ; it, Meninge, Girba), also transliterated as Jerba or Jarbah, is a Tunisian island and the largest island of North Africa at , in the Gulf of Gabès, off the coast of Tunisia. It had a population of 139,544 ...

, and

to destinations in North Africa and Europe, with

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...

and

Toulouse Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and fr ...

Blagnac floated as the first routes. The airline also intends to add narrowbody aircraft to further boost its network in the region and offer sixth-freedom services between Africa and Europe via Tunisia. In January 2019, the airline was granted a new Air Operator's Certificate (AOC) by the Tunisian Ministry of Transport. The certificate was issued on 3 January 2019 and is signed by Habib Mekki, the director general of civil aviation at the ministry. Syphax's founder, Mohamed Frikha, previously stated the company planned to soft-launch as a wet-lease operator once it received its AOC. The initial phase would see the airline's two Bombardier CRJ900s flown on behalf of an external partner in Africa. The wet-lease contract will bring in revenue while the airline finalises its own traffic rights – a process that is expected to take about five months. Scheduled flights will then begin under the Syphax brand, with services planned from Tunis, Sfax and Djerba to Algeria, France, Italy and Spain.

Destinations

Fleet

Syphax Airlines, Airbus A319-112, TS-IEG (10332596696)

As of September 2018, the Syphax Airlines fleet includes the following aircraft:

References

External links

* * {{Airlines of Tunisia Defunct airlines of Tunisia Airlines established in 2011 Airlines disestablished in 2015 2011 establishments in Tunisia Defunct companies of Tunisia