Garuda Indonesia Group has signed a partnership agreement with Sriwijaya Air Group, the first such a cooperation among the Indonesian carriers, the Jakarta Post has reported. In turn, Garuda's subsidiary Citilink (QG, Jakarta Soekarno-Hatta) has signed a separate agreement with TransNusa (8B, Jakarta Soekarno-Hatta), the Indonesian National Air Carriers Association has said in a statement.

The partnership between Garuda and Sriwijaya groups includes a special prorate agreement (SPA) between the two mainline carriers, Garuda Indonesia (GA, Jakarta Soekarno-Hatta) and Sriwijaya Air (SJ, Jakarta Soekarno-Hatta), as well as a more extended code-share agreement which also includes subsidiaries Citilink and NAM Air (IN, Jakarta Soekarno-Hatta).

According to the ch-aviation capacity, Garuda Indonesia and Citlink have a total market share by capacity in the domestic market of 29%, while Sriwijaya Air and NAM Air have a market share of 16.3% between them.

The move can be seen as a way to fight the market leader, Lion Air Group, consisting of low-cost carrier Lion Air as well as Batik Air, and Wings Air (Indonesia), which has a combined market share of 51.4%.

For its part, the cooperation between Citilink and TransNusa includes services connecting via Kupang in East Nusa Tenggara, the southernmost province of Indonesia, and via Makassar on the island of Celebes.