Let's not forget that Katowice's greater metropolitan area (Górnośląskie Zagłębie Węglowe) has over 3.4m inhabitants, making it the largest area in Poland.
Presently, Ryanair, which serves 10 Polish cities and has 38 routes to and from Poland, only has 1 route to Katowice - from Bristol (announced 24th May). In contrast, Wizz Air, which serves 5 Polish cities and has 60 routes to and from Poland, is the dominant airline in Katowice, serving 24 routes.
Why did Ryanair take so long to serve Katowice? Could it be that the airport didn't offer a sufficiently tempting deal? Perhaps. Is it because Katowice is situated between both Wroclaw and Krakow? Maybe.
I do think that Ryanair will launch more routes to and from Katowice, for example to East Midlands, but I don't think they'll materalise quickly but rather over the longer-term.
I have often thought that in general Wizz Air would be a good acquisition prospect for Ryanair - although I'm almost always against inorganic expansion - because it'd enable Ryanair to have an immediate considerable presence in Eastern Europe. Aside that Wizz Air operates different aircraft than Ryanair - which could be easily replaced so isn't important - Wizz Air seems to be very similar strategically to Ryanair, partially evidenced by its use of secondary airports and its relatively infrequent flights on a number of routes. One element that is troublesome to me is Wizz Air's large number of V-V flights, verses Ryanair's very few, and Wizz Air's large amount of bases - 7 - for only 13 aircraft.
Eastern European aviation will become even more exciting in the next few years.
Incidentally, it’s exciting – well, for me at least – that the number of routes to and from Poland have grown dramatically since EU membership and the consequential Open Skies. It’s fascinating that for innumerable years there were barely any flights from any Polish city bar Warsaw, yet 10 Polish cities now have flights by discount airlines and the number of routes are increasing. Of course, discount airlines have been instrumental in Polish migration; indeed, therein is the demand: ethnic and VFR-based traffic. My favourite example is Gdansk. For a long time it didn’t have any service to London (although at one point B.A. flew thrice-weekly to Gatwick) yet this year it’ll have 4 DAILY services. What a dramatic - and at times unbelievable – transformation!