How did airline startups compare to failures since the pandemic’s start
The world has another new passenger airline. Sri Lanka’s Fits Air, born from a cargo airline, began offering low-fare flights from Colombo on Wednesday. It aims to compete with long-troubled SriLankan Airlines, a state-backed entity. Fits Air is hardly alone. Despite a grave pandemic that all but froze worldwide air travel, the past three years have produced a bumper crop of new passenger airlines, some launching even during the depths of the crisis. Conversely, the number of major airlines that disappeared during the pandemic is surprisingly low. In June, IATA counted 66 new passenger airlines born in 2020 and 2021, not much less than the 80 airline deaths it recorded during the same period. In 2019, the industry saw 34 births and 54 deaths. Importantly though, many of the departed carriers were small, some with just a handful of planes. Bankruptcies, to be sure, have been plentiful. Large and influential carriers including Aeromexico, Avianca, Garuda Indonesia, Latam Airlines Group, Norwegian Air, Philippine Airlines, SAS, Thai Airways, Virgin Australia, and Virgin Atlantic Airways all sought court protection from their creditors. But all are still flying today, courtesy in some cases of generous government aid. Billions in government support, meanwhile, prevented many of the world’s other airlines from having to enter bankruptcy. Others like Britain’s Flybe, Mexico’s Interjet, Slovenia’s Adria Airways, and South Africa’s Comair really did disappear altogether. Remarkably though, no airline of major international significance went away. Some like Alitalia were essentially reincarnated in new clothing. In several cases, airlines closed subsidiaries or joint ventures — Cathay Pacific’s discontinuance of the Cathay Dragon brand, for example. AirAsia shuttered its Japanese airline. Virgin Australia waved goodbye to its Tigerair unit. Bankrupt South African Airways, aside from vastly scaling down its network, closed its low-cost carrier, Mango.<br/>
https://portal.staralliance.com/cms/news/hot-topics/2022-10-07/unaligned/how-did-airline-startups-compare-to-failures-since-the-pandemic2019s-start
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How did airline startups compare to failures since the pandemic’s start
The world has another new passenger airline. Sri Lanka’s Fits Air, born from a cargo airline, began offering low-fare flights from Colombo on Wednesday. It aims to compete with long-troubled SriLankan Airlines, a state-backed entity. Fits Air is hardly alone. Despite a grave pandemic that all but froze worldwide air travel, the past three years have produced a bumper crop of new passenger airlines, some launching even during the depths of the crisis. Conversely, the number of major airlines that disappeared during the pandemic is surprisingly low. In June, IATA counted 66 new passenger airlines born in 2020 and 2021, not much less than the 80 airline deaths it recorded during the same period. In 2019, the industry saw 34 births and 54 deaths. Importantly though, many of the departed carriers were small, some with just a handful of planes. Bankruptcies, to be sure, have been plentiful. Large and influential carriers including Aeromexico, Avianca, Garuda Indonesia, Latam Airlines Group, Norwegian Air, Philippine Airlines, SAS, Thai Airways, Virgin Australia, and Virgin Atlantic Airways all sought court protection from their creditors. But all are still flying today, courtesy in some cases of generous government aid. Billions in government support, meanwhile, prevented many of the world’s other airlines from having to enter bankruptcy. Others like Britain’s Flybe, Mexico’s Interjet, Slovenia’s Adria Airways, and South Africa’s Comair really did disappear altogether. Remarkably though, no airline of major international significance went away. Some like Alitalia were essentially reincarnated in new clothing. In several cases, airlines closed subsidiaries or joint ventures — Cathay Pacific’s discontinuance of the Cathay Dragon brand, for example. AirAsia shuttered its Japanese airline. Virgin Australia waved goodbye to its Tigerair unit. Bankrupt South African Airways, aside from vastly scaling down its network, closed its low-cost carrier, Mango.<br/>
