Delta Airlines

Delta Airlines in a major American airline company headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The company was founded on May 30, 1924. They operate as an extensive domestic and international network. Delta currently operates a fleet of more than 700 aircraft and they employ approximately 80,000 people. In 2011 they were the world’s largest airline in terms of fleet size. Delta Airlines is a very successful company. Part of what makes them so successful is expansion, making good decisions in route selection and hubs location, being service oriented, having a strong operation management, being reactive in terms of prices, and offering low fares.

Delta airline uses merger so as to be able to expend its business. In 2008 the company merged with Northwest airlines. It operates in Europe, North America and Asia/Pacific regions. Once the merger was complete, Northwest Airlines and all its constituents become wholly-owned by Delta Airlines. The merger saw to it that Delta Airlines started operating in the Northwest for FY 2008. In the period of two month that is from October of 2008 the time the merger was completed to December of 2008, the company had increased it revenues to $2 billion. Having a flexible nature, allows Delta to improve customer services, and in the long run be able to achieve its strategic objectives.

Delta Airlines initially started out as a very small crop dusting operation named Huff Daland Dusters in 1942 (Delta, 2016). Today, Delta has become one of the largest global airlines with serving more than 160 million travelers each year (Delta, 2016). Delta airlines provide both domestic and international flights to customers to 318 destinations over a span of six continents. They also have nine domestic hubs and three international hubs (Delta, 2016).

Delta Airlines is the largest airline carrier on the Atlantic Coast. In terms of scheduled passengers carried they were world’s largest airline with 277.6 billion in 2013. Also the second largest

Delta airlines offer very comprehensive products and services including, Baggage services, check-in,ecertificate programs, In-flight services, pet care, and services for a person with special needs.

Technological advancements, mergers and acquisitions, volatility in crude oil prices, currency depreciation, ground staff management and baggage handling are the major external factors for Delta Air Lines. The Monroe oil refinery purchased by Delta Air Lines provides an opportunity for the company to deal with the volatility in crude oil prices. Presently Delta Airline is over dependent on the North American markets, which had experienced a major hit during the recession in 2008.

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.

Delta “focuses on shifting their cost structure from fixed to variable costs as much as possible.” (https://rctom.hbs.org/submission/delta-airlines-flying-high-in-a-competitive-industry/) Delta also understands the importance the importance of delivering top notch customer service to appeal to their principal demographic, business travelers. They have incorporated a training work-shop so employees have a better understanding of how to solve travel disruptions that customers deal with. Employees also learn how to help insure that baggage performance is up to par with a low amount of mishandled bags reports from customers. Delta has done this by incorporating a way for customers to track their bags using a mobile app. In the Business Travel News Delta has been ranked #1 by corporate flyers for four years in a row. I believe the business level strategies that Delta has incorporated have been a good choice for their business. Their strategies have helped them to gain a competitive advantage from customer service and great operating cost flexibility.

In recent years, Porter opened a new $50 million 10-gate terminal, increasing take off slots from 167 to 202 (allowing for more flights during the day). Within the last year, Porter Airlines has added service to Newfoundland and Charleston, South Carolina. The company is currently approaching the completion of an underground tunnel, which will increase and improve traffic flow from the terminal to the main land compared to the original transportation via ferry.

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

Problems: Nearly all major airlines had done this unsuccessfully, proved unsustainable over time, never had a high-cost carrier transformed into a low-cost carrier.

The Airline industry has experienced continual problems with rising costs with both fuel and maintenance which has caused them to increase their fees to the consumers to pay for those rising costs. This paper will help explain what an airline such as Delta does to help alleviate such costs without forcing its consumers to flip the bill through high fees that consist of tickets, baggage fees and food. The costs of doing business in aviation today have spiraled out of control making it very expensive for both airlines and the

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.

In the last decade, Continental Airlines has had a spotty track record. The airline twice filed for bankruptcy, realized diminished performance culminating in a $613 million loss in 1994, and was ranked dead last in industry indicators such as on-time performance among the major carriers. During these years, employees at Continental had undergone several series of layoffs and withstood both wage cuts and delayed wage increases in an effort to slash Continental’s costs. The result of these efforts was a demoralized workforce and a corporate reputation that put Continental near the top of Fortune’s list of “least admired” companies.