Etihad Case Analysis

The United States carries over one third of the globe’s total traffic, where Over 1.5 billion passengers fly annually. Over the past 20 years, air travel has grown at an average of about 5% per year, the reason for annual change is usually differences in economic growth, and of course other environmental factors, such as the current war. As a rule, the annual growth in air travel has been about twice the annual growth in GDP. Deregulation, liberalization, and competition have essentially altered the management strategies and practices of airlines. Productivity improvements and cost management have been two of the greatest concerns for US airlines for the past twenty years. As a whole, the airline industry must continue to improve their specialization in terms of fleet utilization, pricing and revenue management, and schedule optimization.

According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, the airline industry experienced losses from 2001 to 2004. In 2005, the industry was profitable for the first time in four years and stayed profitable through 2007. The economic and financial crisis in 2008 took a toll on the industry, causing a few airlines to file bankruptcy. The improvement of the economy in 2009 and 2010 helped the industry get back to profitability. Airlines were using tactics to increase revenues, including charging baggage fees, charging for food and drinks on board, and some airlines charged additional fees for seats with more leg-room. The large increases in revenues helped to offset the higher fuel costs, helping the companies achieve profitability.

In recent years the Airline Industry in Europe has experienced good levels of growth. Despite instances of deceleration the market is forecasted to remain stable producing moderate growth through to the end of the forecast period in 2018. According to a report issued by MarketLine in 2014 the European Airlines industry had total revenues of $180,945.8m in 2013, which represented a compound annual growth rate

While it is difficult, to some extent, to evaluate the success of a merger that is only just now entering its final implementation phases, it is known that the objective of that merger was to use the larger route network to attract more business, and that the combined airline would also extract cost savings as the result of increased operational efficiency. The airline had struggled in 2009, with its sales declining, but it recovered in 2010 and 2011. Sales last year were $33.678 billion, up from $21.068 billion the year before. In the past two years, the company has turned a profit, going from $253 million in net income in FY2010 to $840 million in net income in FY2011. Some of this improvement may stem from the impact of the merger. However, the airline industry is highly cyclical, and the past two years have represented economic improvement. Likewise, the losses the company faced in FY2008 and FY2009 were as much the result of the economic downturn as they were internal business factors.

The airline industry is an extremely competitive industry and is also a highly seasonal industry. Profit can be drastically affected by fluctuations in energy prices or economic downturns (Maverick, 2015). Key financial metrics utilized by analysts in the airline industry include the quick ratio, the return on assets ratio and the debt capitalization ratio, which was already covered earlier (Maverick, 2015).

Rising fuel prices has a huge impact on the airline industry. In an article published by the New York Times in 2007, oil prices were hovering ‘near $100 a barrel’ which caused the International Air Transport Association (IATA) to ‘slash’ their predicted profits for 2008 from ‘$7.8 billion to $5 billion’ (Clark, 2007). In 2008 high fuel prices were ‘dominant factor’ in the losses that faced the industry, and continued to same effect in 2009 (Dunn, 2009). Diagram 2 shows how fuel price has increased and fallen over the last 5 years.

The risk of entry into the airline industry by potential competitors is low due to the “liberalization of market access, a result of globalization. According to the IATA (International Air Transport Association), about 1,300 new airlines were established in the last 40 years,” (Cederholm, 2016). The cost structure of businesses in an industry is a determinant of rivalry. In the Airlines Industry, fixed costs are high, because before the organization can make any sales, they must invest in air crafts, fuel and service employees. These items come attached with hefty price tags. Industries that require such enormous amounts of start-up capital as predicted by many analysts

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.

The airline industry as a whole has been experiencing great treatment. Individuals are proving to pack up their bags and fill up seats and airline companies have been earnings solid profits. Oil prices are continuing to demonstrate volatility and companies are capitalizing on these trends. Given the general uptick, American Airlines is also set to show investors some promising numbers. The Estimize consensus is calling for EPS of

Airlines must operate within a low-margin, high-fixed-cost environment, making profitability particularly sensitive to decreases in volume, either from environmental factors (e.g., the September 11,2001 attacks) or from competition. Moreover, the airline business is labor-intensive. Labor costs as a percentage of revenues ranges from a low of about 25 percent for the low-fare airlines to almost 50

Airlines Industry is large and growing, it is also the most fiercely competitive sector. It facilitates international trade, world economy growth, tourism and international investment. The airline industry has over time with the use of modern technology been able to take advantage of the short haul, high frequency and gained a competitive advantage over other forms of travel, such as buses and railroad travel. Additionally, the airline industry still holds the market for global travel at a low cost and convenient way to travel. The aviation industry gives a good contribution to the GDP which includes the following: airline services, general aviation, civil airport operations, aircraft manufacturing, and

3,4- The Airline industry and the market The airline industry is large, specially in the United States, mainly due to the “ Deregulation” of the industry. In 1938, the Civil Aeronautics Board was created to control the growth of the air transportation industry. This board had the authority to control entry, exit, prices and methods of competition. In the late 1970 this structure was found inefficient and in 1978 deregulation took place. Due to the deregulation of the industry competition intensified, prices dropped, and the number of people travelling increased. Many new companies emerged and regional airlines saw deregulation as an opportunity to expand. Due to the rise in competition, by 1986 mergers started to take place and in 1987 64.8% of the market was controlled by the four largest airlines. The demand for air travel is determined mainly by price, studies revealed that half of the leisure travellers and on quarter of business travellers did not have a preference for a particular airline, which means that prices determined the

According to the latest statistics given by the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the airline sector will post a profit of $9 billion in 2011. After the recent credit crunch, economies are now coming back to normal, business travel is increasing and investments in the airlines are now rising.

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.

Like any organization, Emirates Airline’s business objective is to grow and operate profitably in a mid to up- size market with a whole range of travel products and services which are aligned to Emirates Groups value of choice, competitiveness, quality, service delivery and return on investments by offering finest selection of worldwide destinations, based on and complementing the Emirates network which are customized according to travelers need (Kotler, 1997).