flynas, the national Saudi air carrier and leading low-cost airline in the Middle East, was named the "Middle East's Leading Low-Cost Airline 2019", its fifth year in a row during the World Travel Award ceremony in Abu Dhabi. The award is considered one of the most prestigious within the global travel sector, and recognizes leading international travel and tourism associations. This notable recognition highlights flynas' dedication in offering the best and most efficient low-cost travel solutions to travelers in the Middle East, and is added to a plethora of additional awards won by flynas last year, including the Skytrax award which it won for the second time in a row. In this regard, flynas' CEO Bander Almohanna expressed flynas' pride to achieve this recognition for the fifth consecutive year, stating that it reflects flynas' strategy and commitment to remain at the forefront of low-cost air travel through its special and dedicated team. He added that this award is an international recognition of flynas' sturdy position which it had attained through serving a diversified customer base, catering to their varied travel needs, and enhancing their travel experience through offering an exceptional travel experience and devising innovative services in aims to meet customers' aspirations and attain higher customer satisfaction. Almohanna added that flynas accomplished several milestones in 2018, concluding the year with a total of 6.6 million passengers and 60,000 domestic and international flights. flynas had increased its flights in parallel with the growth in the number of passengers. Furthermore, Almohanna said flynas' expansion strategy seeks to increase its operations locally and globally. He announced a recent Memorandum of Understanding signed with Albania in aims to operate direct flights between the two countries. The carrier had launched trips to several new summer destinations to meet the local demand and offer Saudi passengers more traveling options. Newly added destinations include Tbilisi, Baku, Vienna, and Trabzon in 2018, and Sarajevo and Batumi in 2019, with more destinations underway. — SG
