Alitalia connects Rome to Beijing and to Rio de Janeiro. The inauguration of the two new international services took place today at Rome Fiumicino airport.

The Rome - Beijing flight operates 4 times a week (5 from October) and is an addition to the Rome-Shanghai service in codeshare with China Eastern.

With the opening of the Beijing flight, Alitalia strengthens its presence in the Far East where it already is the only carrier to offer direct links between Italy and Japan.

The Rome - Rio de Janeiro flight will operate with 3 weekly frequencies throughout June, these will increase to 4 in July. The connection to Rio de Janeiro widens Alitalia’s intercontinental network in South America, making Alitalia the first company in terms of connections between Italy and Brazil and the only carrier offering direct scheduled flights from Italy to Rio de Janeiro.

At the opening ceremony of the new flights, which took place at Rome Leonardo da Vinci Airport today, Giancarlo Schisano, EVP Chief Operating Officer of Alitalia, said “China and Brazil represent, together with India and Russia, target markets for the strategy of expansion of intercontinental and international routes; the strategy focuses on areas of the world with the highest growth rate for leisure and business traffic.”

Flights to Beijing and Rio de Janeiro are operated with the new A330 Airbus aircraft featuring a 3-class cabin configuration: Magnifica, Classica Plus and Classica.

The launch of the new flights and the expansion of the intercontinental network were possible thanks to the long-haul fleet growth and renewal plan which, in the last year, has seen the introduction of 4 new Airbus A330s. In the coming months the entry of new A330s and the reconfiguration of the B777’s cabins will allow a further expansion in the Company’s long-haul network and will give Alitalia the possibility to offer an even higher quality of service. More than 50,000 bookings have already been received for the two new routes launched today.

To celebrate the opening of the new routes, Alitalia offered a gift produced by Richard Ginori, one of Alitalia’s partner companies on the intercontinental in-flight service, to all passengers on the inaugural flights.