If Air NZ is hoping for Australian connections via VA, they will be low yielding at best and would add very little to their 'back of the bus' traffic.
EY has effectively been replaced by QR as the second westbound partner.
That's my whole point, Air NZ is a poor partner for VA, with marginal real traffic. The UA codeshare is serving Eastbound and SQ to Asia and Europe is a better option to get cosy with. Air NZ and QF seem to only get involved in local operators for ulterior motives, more to siphon funds, block competition or create an industrial relations wedge. If operators actually got together for mutual benefit then you might create a monster. The US operators have been smart so far to stay with codeshares and not get involved.
However, SQ did try to get into the Australian market (again) by wholly-owning Tiger Airways Australia (via Tiger Airways Holdings). It did not end well for them, plus they were operating in the LCC space rather than the full service space.
Tiger was always a device, not a go at a real airline. It was a go at taking the bottom from the QF group but it was too difficult to get under the skin of J* without the slots, so partnering up with
VB/VA was the only way to give Tiger fighting chance. Have to remember QF was pushing into Asia with J* at the time, Tiger was a try at punching QF in the ribs to make sure they were not getting too much free capital to fund its expansion within Asia. Understanding that some of these budget carriers are not meant to make profit, but drain profit from others and block competitive entries. It also explains the small and far from lifesaving capital injections SQ made into VA to keep it running. Any competition eating into QFs revenue, even if its loss making is better than a QF with free reign on the Aussie domestic market.
Anyway, these should probably be added to the VA threads, not the Rex.