A Hungarian low-cost airline Wizz Air reportedly might face obstacles if it continued to grow the number of services in the country, doubted the Minister of Transport and Communications of Norway.

Knut Arild Hareide, the Norwegian Minister of Transport and Communications, seems not satisfied with Wizz Air’s attempts to tackle the domestic market in Norway. 

On November 26, 2020, speaking to the Parliament, Hareide outlined that the airline must follow Norwegian law and operating conditions differently if it starts operating many domestic routes. 

“When it comes to Wizz Air, they have the opportunity to have flights in Norway,” Hareide was quoted by local media. “But it will probably be more difficult for the company if they increase operations too much when it comes to domestic flights. Wizz Air will probably have challenges with its model if their domestic flight offer gets too large.” 

The tnsion among the Norwegian authorities and Wizz Air ignited in October 2020, when the Hungarian air carrier announced its plans to continue on an aggressive service expansion and shared expectations to launch its first Scandinavian base at Gardermoen Airport (OSL) in Oslo in November 2020. In addition, the Hungarian airline serves three new domestic Norwegian routes, including Bergen, Tromso, and Trondheim, with Airbus A320 and A321 jets.

Wizz Air’s planned expansion in Norway might give serious competition to existing Scandinavian air carriers such as Scandinavian Airlines (SAS), which has one of its hubs in OSL.