All Strategy articles – Page 1031
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News
Fresh start for Virgin Express
The move by Virgin Express to establish a new Irish subsidiary in Shannon will, alongside its fledgling French operation, give the carrier the resources and cost structure it needs to pursue growth. Gus Carbonell, director of marketing and planning at the Brussels-based carrier, says the heavy social charges attached ...
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Why slots maynot be enough
Airline competition authorities may be looking in the wrong direction with demands for slot surrender to tame the global alliances. As the champions of competition continue to do battle over transatlantic airline alliances, it may be worth taking time out to reflect on exactly what they hope to achieve and ...
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End of the road for Southern
Having failed to find a rescuer, Southern Air Transport (SAT) ceased operations at the end of September. The US cargo carrier, which had operated for more than 50 years, was largely hampered by its fleet of Lockheed L-100 Hercules, which left it as an oddball in today's freighter market and ...
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Gaining an edge
Managers may dream of introducing the ground-breaking innovation that reshapes the industry. Or of the revolution that launches their airline to new heights of sustained performance. But in today's real world of increasingly competitive marketplace, victories tend to be smaller, more fleeting and harder to win. Welcome to the age ...
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Deluge of troubles flood Peru
Peruvian aviation was never for the fainthearted, but its current turmoil is volatile even by Lima's standards. The chief executive of bankrupt local carrier Faucett Peru is the apparent victim of a behind-the-scenes power struggle even with his airline in receivership. A new law allowing foreign carriers to operate domestic ...
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Current outlook
There are still some glimmers despite the gloom, it seems. Although there is little doubt that the world is poised for downturn, the latest projections coming out for the airline industry, if not exactly buoyant, are at least cautiously optimistic. The new passenger forecasts from the International Air Transport ...
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Identity crisis
Europe's regional airline executives could be excused for feeling pleased with themselves as they gathered in Hanover for the annual meeting of the European Regions Airline Association (ERA). The industry is again heading for double digit growth this year, expanding at around twice the speed of the majors. Load ...
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POLAR steering a new course
Good navigators, whether in cockpits or corner offices, sense when it is time to change course. The navigators for Long Beach-based Polar Air Cargo think that the time is now. But knowing when to change is only part of their challenge; they also must know what to change and what ...
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SAA gets competitive
South African Airways (SAA), now under its new chief executive Coleman Andrews, has laid out plans to give British Airways much stronger competition on the lucrative London routes and may be seeking closer ties with Virgin Atlantic to help achieve its goal. SAA recently poached Virgin's general manager for ...
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Mega-merger cooks up charter consolidation
Consolidation in the UK holiday market has created a third vertically integrated giant, with the announcement that Thomas Cook is to grow again through a merger with the Carlson Leisure Group. Thomas Cook, which has only just swallowed Sunworld and Flying Colours, will now emerge as a $40 billion travel ...
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CARGO chasing the value chain
The cargo business may once have languished as the Cinderella of the airline industry, perpetually under the shadow of its more glittering cousins in the passenger business. But those days have long since passed. Not only is air cargo now recognised as a lucrative market in its own right, ...
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Regional jets prompt runway campaigns
The regional jet phenomenon is prompting some small US airports to campaign for funds to extend their runways so that they do not find themselves left out in the cold. Managers at Salisbury-Wicomico County Regional Airport in Maryland are the latest to have grown nervous over their inability to ...
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Brussels has slots issue on hold
While Europe's major airlines continue to do battle with the competition authorities in Brussels over transatlantic alliances, it appears that the tussle has quietly claimed another victim - the long-promised European Commission (EC)rules on slot distribution. The EC's transport directorate (DGVII), under Neil Kinnock, started working on a new ...
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Balkan and Malev face sale
The Bulgarian Government is on the verge of selling a controlling stake in its national carrier, Balkan Bulgarian. The buyer is a locally based consortium, calling itself Balkan Air, made up of management, local financiers and a US institutional investor. The original offer is understood to be a straight ...
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Sun Air seeks a listing
A second South African carrier, Sun Air, is planning to seek a listing on the Johannesburg stock exchange. Comair, which operates under a franchise agreement with British Airways, listed in July and Sun Air now plans to follow suit in around 2000. Managing director Johan Borstlap says that he ...
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Air France faces domestic challenge
The going promises to get tough for Air France as European competitors take up positions in its home market, snapping up some key French regional carriers. In the latest deal, Swissair has stepped in to acquire a 44% stake in Air Littoral. The partnership now gives Swissair a ...
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ACI takes second stab at fee hike
US airports will launch another massive campaign - the second this year - to garner support for a $1 increase in the passenger facility charge (PFC). Smarting from the recent defeat of the PFC increase by an 11-8 vote in the Senate aviation subcommittee, directors of the Airports Council ...
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Routes 98
Not so long ago, the idea of airport marketing may well have sounded like a contradiction in terms to the jaded airline route planner. Airport operators looked more like immovable institutions, to be worked around rather than with. But if airports were late to the art of marketing, then ...
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Domestics ignore international opening
The Philippines' three domestic airlines do not plan to fly overseas despite the vacuum left by Philippine Airlines (PAL), which discontinued its international routes at the end of September. All three have permits to fly internationally, but are deterred by poor business prospects. "The Asian economic crunch and the ...
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EVA considers Myanma buy-out
Paul Lewis/SINGAPORE EVA Airways of Taiwan is in discussions to invest in and take over the operations of Myanmar Airways International (MAI) from the carrier's Brunei-backed Singapore joint venture partner Highsonic Enterprises. Senior sources within the Taiwanese airline confirm that a team has been dispatched to MAI to ...