Flights to Colombo from Dhaka will begin on Monday, July 28 to coincide with the start of a summit of south Asian leaders who want to improve co-operation with better connectivity by air between regional capitals.

The Colombo-Dhaka return air ticket will cost 799 dollars including taxes and service charges with a meal being served on board during the three-hour flight, he said in an interview.

"Right now there are no direct flights between Colombo and Dhaka - only via Bangkok, Singapore and even the United Arab Emirates," he said. "This costs more, is time-consuming and inconvenient. Our fare is lower."

Uzzaman said Best Air decided to fly to Male as well on the Colombo flight in order to make the service profitable as the Dhaka-Colombo sector alone is just not enough to fill up the aircraft.

"It would be difficult given the high fuel and operating costs. There's a lot of traffic between Dhaka and Male which will help sustain this service."

About 30,000 Bangladeshis are working in Maldivian tourist resorts and the numbers are increasing.

"In addition, tourists till now never had the chance to fly direct to Male from Dhaka," Uzzaman said.

There is already potential demand between Bangladesh and Sri Lanka because of business between the two countries owing to investments by Sri Lankan firms in Bangladesh in garments, hospitals, banking and schools.

Uzzaman said Bangladeshis are keen to visit Sri Lanka as tourists and to explore business opportunities in the island.

With no competition on the Dhaka-Colombo sector which was last served by Sri Lankan Airlines in 2001, Uzzaman expects the Best Air service to start making profits in two months.

"We need a load factor of 80 percent to break even given the fuel prices and high ground handling charges at the Colombo international airport," he said.

Best Air has tied up with local agent Deccan Aviation Lanka and plans to increase frequency as traffic grows.

It is also looking at the potential for cargo and would then look at a dedicated freighter service.

Best Air operates two leased Boeing 737s and plans to expand the fleet with two Airbus A321 by end-September.

"We plan to expand our route network to Europe and get more aircraft."

Best Air has an annual turnover of about 20 million dollars.

"This year we're projecting a turnover of 60 million dollars because we're expanding our routes," Uzzaman said.

"Other airlines are struggling and cutting down routes. Many airlines are going down. But we're expanding. We have lesser overhead costs while bigger airlines have bigger costs."

Best Air now has services from Dhaka to Chittagong and Bangkok.

It has got traffic rights to Kolkatta and Chennai in India, Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, Singapore, and Dubai, Kuwait and Bahrain in the Middle East. It also plans to fly to Chinese destinations.

Uzzaman said Best Air has a new package called 'fly now-pay later' in which customers can pay the air fare in instalments over 12 months with no interest.

In Bangladesh Best Air has additional services like a valet service - a 'meet-and-greet service' at Dhaka international airport as well as transportation service and an SMS alert two hours before flights.