Low-cost carrier AirAsia X has unveiled plans to launch flights between Kuala Lumpur and Nairobi starting November 15, marking a significant step in the airline’s expansion strategy.

Having secured traffic rights from the Malaysian Aviation Commission (MAVCOM) in April, the airline is poised to offer up to seven weekly flights on this route from October, as reported by aeroroutes.

Kenya, the latest addition to the medium- to long-haul carrier's network, will see four weekly flights, operated by an A330-300. Flight D7101 departs from Kuala Lumpur at 19h00, and return flight D7102 departs from Nairobi at 00:30. The flight takes just over nine hours.

AirAsia X has also set its sights on expanding its African network to include Cape Town and Cairo.

Tony Fernandes, CEO of AirAsia X, said: “With our wide-body Airbus A330 fleet including the introduction of A330neo, we are also looking to expand our medium to long-haul network to the European continent, to cities such as London, Paris, Amsterdam, Bratislava, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Africa (Cairo, Nairobi, Cape Town), east coast North America (New York, Miami, Toronto) via Europe and west coast North America (San Francisco, Los Angeles, Vancouver) via Japan.

“As one of their biggest customers, we have an orderbook of 647 aircraft consisting of 612 A320 Family and 35 A330 Family aircraft with another 362 A321neo, 20 A321XLR and 15 A330neo to be delivered over the next decade as we set our sights on growing bigger than ever in the future.”