Looks like the start of the next change to to the Hub-n-Spoke. The big international hubs move and carriers Meet-n-Swap in the middle.
At first, some carriers will continue with their own end-to-end on the very long hauls to keep market share and reduce risk of bagagge loss with the change.
Then they will find that their costs and prices are much higher and they are losing market share.
So they make similar agreements.
Within 10 years, VERY few of the very/ultra long hauls will operate with single a/c all the way through.
Just a thought.
