Currently, Alaska Airlines ranks among the major U.S. Airlines in terms of financial performance and capabilities. The airline itself has grown from a small regional air carrier to a large passenger airline with a considerable cargo business. The culmination of years of emphasizing the customer service and generating loyalty has manifested itself through Alaska Airlines documented profitability. The success of the airline also comes on its dedication to safety, a fact backed by the FAA’s Diamond Award, which recognized Alaska’s excellent maintenance and training programs. Additionally, Alaska has been recognized for its customer service, a fact that emerged early in the airlines history as the airline offered, and still offers, a means of travel for passengers and cargo in the harsh Alaskan terrain. This along with the largest cargo operation of any U.S. airline are driving factors behind the success of Alaska Airlines. All these factors have allowed Alaska Airlines to rise and remain financially stable. The airline is one of few that weathered the 2000s financial crisis well, and avoided mergers when so many others have been forced into such actions. This report will analyze these factors and related them to Alaska’s current financial performance. It will then make recommendations to maintain profitability, and predict future airline status.
Current Financial Performance Financially speaking, Alaska has maintained steady growth in revenues. The annual total revenue has
Air Canada is Canada 's largest full-service airline and the largest provider of scheduled passenger services in the Canadian market, the Canada-U.S. trans-border market and in the international market to and from Canada. In 2010, Air Canada improved its reputation as one of the world’s leading international air carriers. Significant progress was made on executing and delivering on its four key priorities and this, coupled with improving economic conditions, allowed Air Canada to record operating income of $407 million in 2010, a $677 million improvement from 2009. Air Canada’s financial strategy is to continue to improve both the level and sustainability of its
Alaskan Airlines, through the leadership of Brad Tilden, has been able to provide renowned customer service within in the industry and has been a leader in the innovation of technologies that can be used for the betterment of the aviation industry.
The purpose of this study is to compare Spirit Airlines with American Airlines using the financial ratios of liquidity, activity, debt, profitability and the market, and to derive some concrete conclusions about the financial nature of Spirit Airlines. According to Spirit Airlines (2015) “Historic Stock Lookup,” from 2011 to 2014, the year-end stock prices have increased by 79.4%, which is outstanding. Thus, Spirit Airlines will be used as a benchmark in terms of comparing
having come a long way from its storied Alaskan bush plane roots. Today, Alaska Airlines is the
In the past three years the airline industry has faced an unparalleled list of challenges and American Airlines has certainly had more than the others. Year by year AA has tried to recover with a great deal of effort to turn the company around. The strategies they are applying to counteract the status are : Lower costs to compete, give to the customers the service they are expecting
In 2008, the senior management team at Continental Airlines, commanded by Lawrence Kellner, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, convened a special meeting to discuss the firm’s latest quarterly financial results. A bleak situation lay before them. Continental had incurred an operating loss of $71 million dollars—its second consecutive quarterly earnings decline that year. Likewise, passenger volume was significantly down, dropping by nearly 5 percent from the prior year’s quarter. Continental’s senior management needed to act swiftly to reverse this trend and return to profitability.
American airline industry is steadily growing at an extremely strong rate. This growth comes with a number economic and social advantage. This contributes a great deal to the international inventory. The US airline industry is a major economic aspect in both the outcome on other related industries like tourism and manufacturing of aircraft and its own terms of operation. The airline industry is receiving massive media attention unlike other industries through participating and making of government policies. As Hoffman and Bateson (2011) show the major competitors include Southwest Airlines, Delta Airline, and United Airline.
1. There are a few trends in the US airline industry. One is consolidation, wherein existing players merge in an attempt to lower their costs and generate operating synergies. The most recent major merger was the United Continental merger, which is still an ongoing affair, but has created the largest airline in the United States by market share (Martin, 2012). Another trend is towards low-cost carriers. In the US, Southwest has been a long-running success and JetBlue a strong new competitor, but in other countries this business model has proven exceptionally successful. The third major trend is the upward trend in jet fuel prices, and the increasing importance that this puts on hedging fuel prices and capacity management (Hinton, 2011).
This report provides an examinaion of the current structure, performance, stragergy and management of Delta Airlines, along with an industry analysis of the airline industry. The report uses current and past financial and statistical data for the company along with other up to date material to determine Delta's current market position and future potential.
The United States economy has been able to grow steadily after the 200 recessionand because of this, most businesses have been able to also grow effectively. The airline should therefore invest heavily in refurbishing its aircrafts and also investing in projects that will attract employees. To fully take advantage of this project, the United airline should embrace good marketing startegies and also provide competitive prices to its customers.
From the humble financial portfolio as a crop dusting outfit in the mid twentieth century, to the multi-billion dollar portfolio of a major airline in the twenty first century, Delta Air Lines has risen as a successful business. The airline industry is directly affected by outside economic conditions and is also cyclical in nature. These factors make it very difficult for airlines to make predictions to stay financially afloat. Delta has ridden the bumpy path of the last twenty years and managed to survive. In the past twenty years there has been many events that
There have been few inventions to change how people live and experience the world considerably as the creation of the airplane. Today, traveling by air has become the norm and it would be difficult to imagine life without it. Air travel has improved the way people are able to conduct business by shortening travel time and changing their thought of distance. The companies within the airline industry exist in a very competitive market. One of those companies, Southwest Airlines, features low-fare, no-frills air service with frequent flights of mostly short routes. Costs are kept down by the exclusive use of Boeing 737 aircraft, which allows for low maintenance costs and quicker turnaround times for flights, and by an emphasis on ticketless travel (Encyclopedia Britannica). This paper will address two segments of the general environment and how they affect Southwest and the airline industry; evaluate how Southwest has addressed two forces of competition; predict what Southwest might do to improve its ability to addresses these forces; assess the external threats affecting Southwest; discuss Southwest’s greatest strengths and most significant weaknesses; determine Southwest’s resources, capabilities, and core competencies; and analyze their value chain.
As with all airlines, Delta’s recent performance has been significantly impacted by industry shifts and external events. Terrorist attacks and escalating costs have significantly impacted Delta’s profitability in recent history (Rivkin 4). The company has also been losing valuable market share to the low-cost carrier Southwest Airlines throughout the southeast and specifically in the lucrative Florida market (Rivkin 8). JetBlue also began encroaching on key Delta routes, and this seems only likely to increase (Rivkin 9). Despite this, Delta has still performed better than any other legacy carrier (Rivkin 8). Still, recent history has brought several changes to this legacy carrier, and the company has turned its attention towards new competitive strategies.
Upon review on a profile of a successful company we see Southwest Airlines as a prime example. Their ability to recognize weakness in their management system and adjust strategies has allowed them to emerge as a leader in the US airline industry. Southwest is the largest US low fare carrier with low fare rates, no additional fees and excellent customer service. Southwest Airlines currently has one of the most innovative management practices in the US to date. A review of the critical elements of Southwest Airlines proves to be effective and innovative.
When it comes to performance and profitability, every airline’s dream is to have a high profit margin with a superior performance for each quarter every year. However, not every airline is successful in attaining such results, mostly due to multiple reasons that result in detrimental financial woes. Avianca Airlines does not fall into this category, or any type that reflects a struggling company. Avianca has prospered tremendously throughout the last several years, mostly due to a multitude of smart and well thought out financial decisions.