It plans to operate on a new route — Bangkok-Lamphun — from this April, Kreawan Wongrakmit, president of Nakhonchai Air Co Ltd, said.

The company generated income in 2019 of Bt1.795 billion with average passengers for the year at 4.1 million people, roughly the same as in the previous year.

“Last year Nakhonchai Air opened new routes from Bangkok to Sanom district in Surin province and to Paksaeng district in Ubon Ratchathani province,” she said. “Currently we have 41 routes nationwide.”

Kreawan added that the company was planning to open a new route to Lamphun this April. “We will add more trips on the Bangkok-Surin route, increasing from 10 trips a day to 14, and on the Bangkok-Buri Ram route from 11 trips a day to 16 by June, as well as open a new branch office in Ayutthaya province next month, which will help facilitate customers who wish to travel to Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, Nan and Uttaradit.”

In the long-term, Kreawan said the company will expand routes to connect downtown areas of main tourist provinces to secondary tourist provinces to enlarge the tourism network and disperse capital and investment to rural communities. “This business plan is in compliance with the government’s policy to stimulate the economy of local communities and increase employment for local people to reduce overcrowding in big cities,” she added.

At present Nakhonchai Air have a fleet of 56 coaches comprising 12 NCA First Class and 34 NCA Gold Class. “By 2021, we expect to add 45 coaches with a budget of Bt315 million,” said Kreawan.

Firms are prepping plans that include: Activating backup sites and splitting up teams, so if an outbreak hits one office, their colleagues can continue elsewhere. Sanitizing every surface hourly — from traders’ desks and phones to the elevator buttons. Shutting company gyms and maybe cafeterias. Designating rooms to send sickened staff until an ambulance arrives.

It’s a snapshot of what life might look like on Wall Street and across an industry that can’t take a break as global markets swoon over the prospect the virus will run rampant. The plans were described by Regina Phelps, a four-decade veteran of continuity planning and the founder of Emergency Management & Safety Solutions.

She said she’s urging clients — which have included the World Bank, Wall Street custody giant Northern Trust Corp. and the three largest U.S. credit-card networks — to hone their plans now for a situation that could develop quickly.

“If you get the first case in your office, you need to know exactly what you’re going to do,” Phelps said. “The health department will shut you down for 14 days. Then what?”

JPMorgan Chase, the world’s biggest trading house, restricted all non-essential travel globally this week. It told employees in a memo to start testing their ability to work remotely. Other major banks have curbed travel to affected regions.

Phelps and other consultants predict Wall Street will place personnel further apart along notoriously crowded desks. Some can work from home, but that isn’t possible for everyone. Many roles rely on access to closely guarded internal systems and third-party trading venues. For banks, it’s also easier to monitor traders for compliance and risk management when they’re in the office.

Some financial firms don’t have companywide systems for tracking absences in real time. Instead, employees who aren’t feeling well notify their managers, who make adjustments on the team. That must change, Phelps said, so that senior executives can detect potential outbreaks faster.

In the U.S., the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council has been requiring banks to create plans for a potential pandemic for more than a decade. That includes programs to prevent an outbreak from spreading inside a firm, but also steps to continue communicating with customers.

But big banks have been publicly tight-lipped about what specific steps they may take to bolster their domestic operations. Privately, some senior executives acknowledge that they’re still trying to decide. So life on Wall Street still looks relatively normal, even as U.S. authorities shift their tone to say the question is no longer if, but when, the virus may arrive.

Still, measures prescribed by consultants can be seen abroad. As outbreaks erupted in South Korea, banks including UBS Group AG and Citigroup Inc. began splitting workers among different locations to ensure business can continue. Some locations in Europe may follow suit as the virus spreads there.

“As you can imagine, it’s a bit tense,” said Zoeb Sachee, head of European government bond trading at Citigroup.

Many U.S. banks have built backup sites so they can maintain operations for clients during storms or other natural disasters, said Michael Faber, global head of business continuity management at interdealer broker TP ICAP Plc. But those facilities can also help firms weather a pandemic.

“If you’re trading a product and you’ve got 10 people on the desk, why not move three to five of those brokers or traders to that recovery site?” Faber said. “If somebody does come into the office and potentially infects or ensures that the whole desk needs to go into quarantine, the service for the client can still continue.”

For now, traders in New York and London are concentrating on keeping up with the wild volatility of markets. By the close of trading on Thursday, the S&P 500 had its fastest correction on record.

“Busy!” said Peter Chatwell, head of European rates strategy at Mizuho International, referring to the bank’s trading floor. “Full of client activity!”

On Friday, United Airlines announced it would cancel some flights to Japan, Singapore and Seoul. The airline also said it would extend cancellations of flights between the U.S. and China through the end of April. American and Delta have already suspended China service though the end of April.

“We will stay in close contact with the CDC and other health organizations as we continue to evaluate our schedule,” United said in a statement.

The announcement came as the World Health Organization raised it assessment of the coronavirus to “very high,” citing the risk of spread and impact.

Delta Air Lines this week also suspended service between its hub at Minneapolis/St. Paul and South Korea beginning Feb. 29 through the end of April. It is reducing flights to and from South Korea from Atlanta, Detroit and Seattle through April 30 and is delaying the launch of service between Incheon and Manila. Those flights, set to launch March 29, will now begin on May 1, the airline said.

Earlier this week, Hawaiian Airlines suspended nonstop service between Honolulu’s Daniel K. Inouye International and Incheon International airports starting March 2 through the end of April. The airline is also offering to waive change fees for travels between Honolulu and South Korea through May 1.

United, American and Delta also have extended travel waivers for flights to and from Northern Italy, which has seen a significant uptick in the number of infections.

The moves come amid concerns about the virus, which has continued to spread worldwide. The covid-19 disease, once centered in China, has now spread worldwide, with the number of new infections in other countries outpacing the number in China. South Korea, which said the number of people infected is now more than 2,300, has been among the hardest hit, but Italy too is working to contain an outbreak in the northern region of the country. On Friday, France and Germany reported increases in the number of infections.

The travel industry – from airlines to hotels to cruise ships – has been hit hard.

A survey released this week by the Global Business Travel Association estimated the virus could potentially cost the industry $46.6 billion per month. That number translates to $559.7 billion annually.

A snap poll of association members this week, found that the virus has had a major impact on business travel to Asia, with 95 percent of companies reporting cancellations or suspensions of all business travel to China. In January, all three major U.S. carriers announced they were halting all fights to China and to Hong Kong. About one-fourth of those surveyed said they’ve also canceled or suspended travel to Europe.

“It is clear that the coronavirus is having a significant – and potentially very costly – effect on our members, their companies and on the overall business travel industry,” said Scott Solombrino. GBLT’s chief operating officer. “It is fundamentally affecting the way many companies are now doing business. If this turns into a global pandemic, the industry may well lose billions of dollars – an impact that will have negative ramifications for the entire global economy.”

Of the total, 90 per cent will be spent on the expansion of its natural gas and renewable energy businesses to boost its total production capacity.

She added that the company was in talks with partners in US and Asia to seek investment opportunity in the Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) business.

Banpu reported a total revenue of US$2.759 billion for 2019, a decrease of 21 per cent year on year.

The company is moving forward with ‘Greener’ strategy by fostering green energy business growth, fueled by increased proportion of shale gas business, and establishing Banpu NEXT Company Limited to develop and expand clean energy and energy technology businesses in line with the world’s future energy trend.

Somruedee said that Banpu would continue to strengthen and balance the business ecosystem between its core business groups — Energy Resources, Energy Generation, and Energy Technology with a focus on creating business growth that responds to the energy trend of the future.

To pursue sustainable growth through the Greener & Smarter strategy, Banpu invested US$ 770 million in December last year to acquire a shale gas asset in Barnett, Texas. The state is the biggest shale gas consumer in the US, representing 15 per cent of the country’s total demand.

The investment in Barnett has the potential of a quick payback within 6 years, while its gas reserves would last for 16 years.