Cathay Pacific Rebrand DragonAir As “Cathay Dragon”


Cathay Pacific today announced that DragonAir will cease to exist, instead the sister airline to Cathay Pacific will be rebranded as Cathay Dragon. In a press release announced today, Cathay Pacific’s Chief Executive Ivan Chu said “In aligning the Cathay Pacific and Cathay Dragon brands, we will create a more seamless journey for customers, enabling us to deliver on our promise of a ‘Life Well Travelled’.”


However the airline also announced the two airlines won’t be merged, instead continuing to operate as two separate carriers, with just the name and brand changing rather than the operation. Talking of brand, Cathay Dragon has adopted the new livery design of Cathay Pacific, whilst turning the blue and green areas to red. This inadvertently has given the carrier a touch of Qantas and Turkish Airlines if viewed from far away – although both have limited cross over with Cathay Dragon’s routes.


“We see this a real Hong Kong success story, and we aim to ensure the success continues. Through this rebranding, we will make it much clearer to customers that they are flying on a member of the Cathay Pacific Group, and we have created a new look for Cathay Dragon that clearly identifies it as a Group airline.”

“There are two main reasons behind this rebranding, the first being a desire to capitalise on Cathay Pacific’s strong international brand recognition. The second driver is to leverage on Cathay Dragon’s unique connectivity into Mainland China.” continued Ivan Chu. It’s fair to expect little difference to the cabin products, as there is already a strong synergy between the two carriers.


  1. Kenneth

    {{{ sigh }}} And so another regional airline loses its individuality. The dragon logo is great (what’s more Chinese than a mythical, fire-breathing dragon?) and should remain on the tail, instead of ending up as almost an afterthought, applied in miniature behind the cockpit windows. There were so many other options for Cathay Pacific if they wanted to establish a greater visual link with Dragonair. One option would have been to retain the dragon, but on tail fins painted Cathay Pacific green, instead of the current white.
    Heck, why not just paint all of Dragonair’s planes in Cathay Pacific’s livery, place an “Operated by Dragonair” sticker by the boarding door, and be done with it.

  2. atul jain

    Are there no colours other than red or dark blue which airlines can consider? Especially red has become so commonplace that it has started looking repetitive.

  3. Garlic

    i think, being from hk and often flying cathay and dragon air that they should be merged and have Cathay Pacific and Cathay Regional, like many other airlines
    the livery i dont like though

  4. I like it but its a bit too austere and needs a bit more…a small splash of red would have been great. And a small splash of turquoise for Cathay Dragon as well.

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