Swiss will open an all-new first class lounge at Zurich Airport by the end of this year, to be followed by upgrades for its existing Business Class and Senator Lounges in Zurich's Terminal A.

The lounges represent an investment of 15 million Swiss Francs (A$19.5 million) in "premium ground product" for the Star Alliance member.

The new first class lounge will be located at the Check-In 1 concourse and come with its own security checkpoint for a fast-track experience and be just a "short dedicated walk" to limousine transport.

Across 650m² Swiss will offer an à la carte restaurant, 'front cooking' and a tended bar serving over 100 different grappas, to give it a different characteristic from the airline's current first class lounges.

A much-needed refurbishment of the Terminal A Business Class and Senator Lounges is slated for completion in the first quarter of 2018. 

The new digs are expected to embrace the modern design of their Terminal E cousins, include the first class lounge...

... and Senator/Business lounges.

“Our new premium product on the ground will offer our customers genuinely new levels of air travel comfort and convenience,” says Swiss CEO Thomas Klühr.

Anna Brändli, Swiss' Manager of Ground Services Product, last year indicated to Australian Business Traveller that the sweeping bar which adjoins both the Business and Senator lounges – and which at 27.6 metres in length has been declared the world's longest tended airport bar – will finally be declared a non-smoking zone.

"We have so much space for smokers and only a few are smoking, and so this is a waste of a good location,"  Brändli said.

Swiss will also extend its inflight Internet to medium- and short-haul aircraft fleets starting in 2018; refurbish its five remaining Airbus A340s; and switch its final five Bombardier C Series aircraft orders from the CS100 to the larger CS300.