Emirates' US chief dishes details on United partnership, business-class retrofits

The United States is one of the most important markets for Emirates airline.

From its megahub in Dubai, Emirates flies to 12 destinations in the U.S., with up to 14 peak-day flights touching down each day across the country.

Emirates even flies two fifth-freedom flights from Newark to Athens and from New York to Milan, both of which continue onwards to Dubai. From there, Emirates offers an impressive connecting network, bringing travelers to cities in India, Southeast Asia and nearly everywhere else in between.

Emirates faces some stiff competition from its Gulf rivals on most of the itineraries that it sells from the U.S., though there's no denying that the Dubai-based carrier has perhaps one of the strongest — and most-awarded — brands in aviation.

The airline is a fan-favorite for TPG readers, and here's the latest on what's going on with the carrier's U.S. network.

Emirates, United partnership is a 'win-win'

Just over a year ago, Emirates and United announced a once-unthinkable partnership.

The tie-up includes codesharing on select flights, reciprocal loyalty benefits, lounge access in Dubai and much more. In fact, United even started flying to Dubai earlier this year, ending a nearly seven-year-long streak of not serving the Gulf metropolis.

Long-time aviation observers might remember the mid-to-late 2010s, when United, along with Big 3 U.S. rivals Delta and American, unified in protests against the so-called ME3 carriers: Emirates, Qatar Airways and Etihad Airways.

American, Delta and United alleged that these fast-growing Middle Eastern airlines took subsidies from their respective governments, which enabled the airlines to provide superior service at a competitive price on long-haul routes to the U.S.

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But that campaign is most certainly now in the history books, and looking back on the first year of the Emirates-United tie-up shows some serious promise.

"The winner is all three of us, including the passengers and both carriers. It's been a very good win-win situation for both. And it's still a collaborative approach, and we're doing it step by step, and we're reaping the benefits," Essa Ahmad, Emirates divisional vice president for the U.S. and Canada, said in an exclusive interview with TPG.

Ahmad specifically cited the increased feed that Emirates is seeing in three key United hubs (Chicago, San Francisco and Houston) as one of the big bright spots of the partnership. Beyond Dubai, many passengers are looking to travel to India, but that market has been a bit tricky for the two carriers since the Indian government blocked Emirates and United from codesharing on flights from Dubai to India.

Even so, the partnership still seems to be working in the airlines' favor, according to Ahmad. Aside from boosting flight options, the airlines are working on "collaborating" in the passenger journey.

So far, the carriers have "done some collaborative approaches using the lounge at Dubai Airport and having [United] fly out from the same terminal that we fly out of Dubai," said Ahmad.

That's not all, however. "There is more of a collaborative approach between our airport managers. Even our sales teams, they talk to each other, see where we can do any joint marketing," Ahmad said.

"We always say, this is just a start," he said.

Game Changer is back

Just a few days ago, Emirates won the TPG Award for the world's best first-class product.

This product, dubbed the "Game Changer," is available on just nine Boeing 777-300ER aircraft, making it one of the most exclusive cabins in the sky.

Ever since its introduction, Emirates has largely kept this cabin limited to medium- and long-haul routes to Europe, as opposed to flying it to the U.S.

While Emirates first class is always a joy to fly, the Game Changer is special. Much like a roomette on a train, the Game Changer is a fully enclosed suite — making it the only first-class product in the world to offer complete privacy. Plus, with just six individual suites, the cabin feels stately and intimate.

In 2020, Emirates flew the Game Changer to the U.S. on a consistent basis, but once demand picked back up, the airline quickly replaced the 777 with the double-decker Airbus A380.

Since then, the Game Changer hasn't reappeared on U.S. routes — until now.

Through March 30, 2024, you'll find the Boeing 777-300ER equipped with the Game Changer flying to Washington on a daily basis.

As for why, it largely comes down to the massive aircraft retrofit project going on at Emirates, Ahmad said. With 67 Airbus A380s scheduled to be retrofitted in the coming months, the airline has needed to pull this plane from certain routes, including the one to D.C.

Premium economy is another winner

While Emirates is the first of the three Gulf megacarriers to install a premium economy cabin, the airline is very much playing catch-up with the rest of the industry that's been flying this elevated product for years.

But while it took Emirates a little longer than its U.S. and European peers to install premium economy, the carrier clearly spent some time thinking about the details — and it's paying off.

"We have more than 160,000 customers who have flown it," Ahmad said, adding that "we were a bit late in coming, but I think that's the time that we took to just perfect it and reach to a stage where that product is actually a differentiator between the economy class and making sure that it has a different service."

The carrier started flying this cabin on a daily frequency to New York in 2021, and it's since expanded it to 13 destinations worldwide, including all four of the airline's current A380 gateways in the U.S.: New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Houston.

As the carrier keeps retrofitting its jets, it'll keep adding more premium economy gateways in the U.S., Ahmad confirmed, declining to provide additional timeline details for when that might happen.

Business-class upgrades are coming

Though Emirates offers the world's best first-class and premium cabins, the same can't be said for business class.

In fact, this much-beloved carrier actually offers one of the world's least competitive products across much of its fleet. Most of Emirates' Boeing 777s feature a woefully outdated biz cabin with middle seats in a 2-3-2 configuration.

This means that you don't get much privacy, and no matter where you sit, you'll either need to climb over someone or be climbed over when trying to use the lavatory.

While the service and amenities that Emirates offers might be some of the best in the sky, the actual seat on the Boeing 777 leaves a lot to be desired.

Emirates, however, is well aware of this, Ahmad said, explaining that "because of the number of aircraft that we have, it's not as easy an option to just kind of take it out of service and do the whole retrofit for the aircraft."

Ahmad wouldn't get into the details, but he teased that Emirates is working on an all-new business-class product. "We always say, just watch the space ... things are going to move to a better product for sure," he said.

What that means is still anyone's guess, but recent reports say that Emirates will finally introduce a 1-2-1 configuration in business class on the Boeing 777.

Suffice it to say, I'm going to heed Ahmad's word and watch the space — I, for one, can't wait for Emirates to introduce a competitive biz product on the Boeing 777.