Us Airline Industry 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.

Investors saw favorable returns from airlines in 2014. The airline industry’s average return on invested capital (ROIC) reached 5.4% in 2014, which is up from 3.7% in 2012, and 4.4% from 2013. All of the growth in the airline industry has occurred in spite of a decade of terrorist fears, a 1.8 billion annually fare hikes from 2002 through 2011, and the implementation of many risk management travel screening measures. As the years have passed after the 9/11 attacks, the fear of traveling and rise of fares has ceased due to the security measures and great customer service the airline industry as a whole provides travelers.

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).

Air transport is a global industry and as such every airline is a likely challenger for every other. It is contrary to expectation that any airline will be able to contest on a large scale without being associated to other carriers. Traffic feed is the industry's lifeblood and stand-alone carriers will be labored to carry low-revenue point-to-point traffic when front with airlines able to offer manifold route alliances. Southwest Airlines is a major carrier to the USA accounting for about 85% of its airfreight tonnage, but it also operates scheduled services to South Africa, Japan and Hong Kong. The subject of strategic alliances inside the air transport industry is not a well-researched area. This is due, in part, to the truth that

Southwest’s primary competitors are JetBlue and Spirit Airlines. These two airlines, like Southwest, focus on innovation and low airfare costs. Among the largest airlines are American, Delta, and United. However, these mainline carriers are far from posing any major threat to Southwest. (Coulter, pg 253)

At the onset of the airline industry in the United States, major network airlines were the sole providers of air travel. This multifaceted industry was a difficult industry to break into as a consequence of “sophisticated customer segmentation, hub-and spoke models and costly information systems for reservations, fare wars and intense competition” (Thompson 2008). Shrinkage in airline ticket prices augmented the demand for airline travel. Many markets were simply deserted or over-looked by major network airlines; this is a region a fresh “second tier of service providers” could enter into. This endeavor proved to provide a consumer savings of billions per year. Thus in June of 1971, after a tumultuous battle with other Texas-based

In April 1992, American Airlines launched "Value Pricing" -- a radical simplification of the complex pricing structure that had evolved over more than a decade following deregulation of the U.S. domestic airline industry. American expected that the new pricing structure would benefit consumers and restore profitability to both American and the industry as a whole. The critical issue raised is: Would American's bold initiative work?

American Airlines has went through bankruptcy and a merger, and they are still flying. Many people would identify American Airlines (AAL) as once being “great.” Today, it is not seen as highly as it once was, but the CEO, Doug Parker, believes the company will, in fact, be great again. He is quoted in multiple articles stating the company is working hard to make AAL “the greatest airline in the world.”

The following report of American Airlines and United Airlines, two American based airlines, analyzes and compares the composition of their respective fleets. These two air carriers are major airlines in the United States. Both airlines serve domestic and international flight, and since the year of 2006 have merged with other airlines. The report compares the aircraft inventory and age for American Airlines and United Airlines from the year 2006 until 2015, and incorporates the airlines that have merged with these in the time frame. The analysis utilizes data provided by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology through their Airline Data Project, as well as data gathered by the Bureau of Transportation Statistics.

In recent years, the U.S. airline industry has been restructured and consolidated into a number of mergers. By 2014, the top 6 airlines controlled 94% of domestic market share by available seat miles. Mergers in the U.S. airline industry reduce competition and increase efficiency in resource utilization. It also benefits customers with a wider range of coverage with more routes and destinations. It was inevitable for American Airline to become a merger. After 2005, when the top airlines merged (Delta with Northwest and United with Continental), American was starting to lose its market share to its peers. Competitors took advantage of enlarged capacities and geographic coverage, while America was struggling to maintain its unit revenue. American’s

This proposed merger would create the largest airline in the United States by market share, with a combined 21.2% of the domestic market using pre-merger market share levels (see Figure 1). The proposed merger would also bring the total number of major domestic airlines down to four: Delta, United, Southwest and the proposed new airline. These major domestic carriers would combine to control roughly 69% of the market, a dominant position.

The Risk of Entry by Potential Competitors – Since the deregulation of the airline industry in 1978 over 1,300 new airlines have opened for business. However, most now are bankrupt or merged with the other carriers to stay workable. The established giants were Delta (merged with Northwest), American Airlines (merged with U.S. Airways), United Airlines (merged with Continental), and now Alaska Airlines (merged with Virgin America). Now the Low-Cost Carriers (LCCs) are posing a massive threat which includes Southwest Airlines (merged with Air Tran), and JetBlue.

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

• Provide background on the global industry • Present a regional analysis • Discuss current and future evolvement of the industry (trends) • Discuss challenges and strategies impacting the industry • Discuss the new breed of airlines • Discuss why airlines fail and how to achieve success

The Airline Deregulation Act of 1978 within the United States promulgated an era of unencumbered competition within the market, opening the floodgates for newer carriers – with a variety of lower pricing structures – to compete with formidable incumbents. Numerous carriers consequently filed for bankruptcy, and many of the industry leads consolidated their airlines to increase their power. Within the last twelve years alone, a series of bankruptcies and mergers have resulted in ten major U.S. airlines consolidating into four market-dominating mega-carriers: American, Delta, Southwest, and United. Why is