general

Airlines should financially reward managers who hire more women, said the International Aviation Womens Association, after industry data showed almost zero progress toward gender parity in the past four years. Women typically hold just 13% of executive posts at carriers, even fewer than in financial services firms, Bloomberg analysis showed last month. The proportion of female pilots, technicians or chief executive officers wallows at less than 10%, according to a 2022 report by the US government’s Women in Aviation Advisory Board. The figures suggest decades of advocacy and voluntary targets for female representation are failing to deliver material advances. Managers should instead be incentivized, either with pay or promotion, to recruit a larger proportion of women, said Kathleen Guilfoyle, the president of the International Aviation Womens Association. Pay should also be benchmarked against how well female workers are retained and succeed, she said. “There has to be some sort of accountability,” Guilfoyle said in a video interview from Boston, where she’s an attorney specializing in aviation litigation. But she said imposing gender quotas is too often considered punitive. “It doesn’t encourage people or the development of women as much as being goal-oriented,” she said. The IATA in 2019 introduced its 25by2025 campaign, where airlines commit to increasing the number of women in senior positions and under-represented areas by 25%, or to a minimum of 25% by 2025. But the initiative is voluntary, and only half of IATA’s almost-300 member carriers had signed by late last year. There’s a persistent lack of leadership on the issue, said Guilfoyle. There needs to be more senior executives identifying, sponsoring and mentoring talented women, she said.<br/>

The FAA said on Thursday it was taking steps to improve its air traffic control operations after a series of near-miss incidents raised questions about US aviation safety. "There is no question that we are seeing too many close calls," FAA Air Traffic Organization COO Tim Arel said in a message to employees reviewed by Reuters. On Wednesday, the FAA issued a separate safety alert to airlines, pilots and others citing the "need for continued vigilance and attention to mitigation of safety risks." Six serious runway incursions since January prompted the agency to convene a safety summit last week. Arel said the FAA would ensure that supervisors devote their full attention to the operation and airfield during peak traffic periods, provide more dedicated training for unusual circumstances and update simulator software for the first time since 2016. NTSB chair Jennifer Homendy said last month a FedEx cargo plane and a Southwest Airlines plane had come within 100 feet of each other in what could have been a "terrible tragedy." The FAA plans to work with the air traffic controllers union "to reinforce existing safety protocols, especially those that help increase situational awareness," Arel said, adding the FAA would re-examine runway incursion data to identify underlying factors that led to the close calls and to find fixes. The FAA faces an air traffic control staffing shortage and wants funding to boost controller numbers. National Air Traffic Controllers Association President Rich Santa said last week there are 1,200 fewer certified air traffic controllers than a decade ago.<br/>

Frankfurt Airport said it won’t be able to provide regular service on March 27 as workers stage a one-day strike at Germany’s biggest aviation hub, adding to disruptions that have hobbled the European travel market for months amid persistent pay disputes. The airport warned of “massive disruption” of air traffic, saying that “all tasks that enable full flight operations are suspended due to the strike” on the day, according to a statement. Passengers, including those changing at Frankfurt airport, should avoid travel to the hub on the day, airport operator Fraport said in the release. Strikes have rippled through the aviation industry for months as workers in areas like baggage handling and security services seek higher wages amid a cost-of-living squeeze. The dispute hits the industry ahead of the peak travel period, with Easter approaching and travelers returning in droves after years of Covid restrictions. <br/>

Nigeria is aiming to release money from foreign airlines' ticket sales, held up by dollar shortages in the country, and has already started making some payments, Aviation Minister Hadi Sirika said on Thursday. Nigeria is facing severe dollar shortages, forcing many citizens and businesses to seek foreign exchange on the black market, where its naira currency has progressively weakened. The dollar shortages have made it difficult for some foreign airlines that sold tickets in the Nigerian naira to get their money out of the country. A spokesperson for the global airlines industry association IATA said last week that Nigeria was withholding $743m in revenue earned by international carriers operating in the country, the highest amount owed by any nation. Sirika did not provide a timeline for releasing the trapped funds. He said Qatar Airlines had $201m blocked while another $216m was owed to IATA airlines. "We are doing our best to get the monies released," Sirika told reporters in Abuja.<br/>

Investors hoping to cash in on a boom in Chinese travel after nearly three years of pandemic lockdowns are shifting into airports, hotels and duty-free operators and away from airlines subject to fluctuating fuel prices and more intense competition. The first wave of bullishness as China began abandoning its zero-COVID policy in December lifted airline stocks and online travel agencies like Trip.com Group. But with global airlines being slow to add capacity to connect China with the US and Europe and Chinese travellers preferring trips closer to home, a new set of stocks is benefiting. Thailand has re-emerged as a favourite destination for Chinese travellers, and also for investors. "We were active earlier in terms of domestic travel, lodging space and airports, where we've done quite well," said Elaine Tse, portfolio manager at Allspring Global Investments. Tse said the firm has locked in some profits from those bets. "We are optimistic on a rebound in regional and international travel and continue to get exposure through airports and airplane leasing." Shares of airports, such as Airport of Bangkok and Shanghai International Airport have underperformed the big three Chinese airlines Air China, China Eastern and China Southern since the start of November, leaving room for further gains in the former. Investors say airline stocks are not only expensive, but their earnings tend to be volatile and susceptible to swings in oil prices.<br/>

The Indian ministry of civil aviation has set a long-term goal of reaching 1b air passengers by 2040, as stated in their 2019 “Vision 2040 for the Civil Aviation Industry in India” document. The country recognizes the need to focus on growing infrastructure and hiring manpower to accommodate the growing number of passengers, which is expected to grow six-fold to around 1.1b by 2040. The government also has plans to construct an additional 26 airports under its regional connectivity scheme and invest $11.9b to modernize and construct new airports by 2025. Additionally, India is also increasing the number of flying training organizations and facilities for aircraft maintenance, repair, and overhaul, said Indian civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia. As economic growth, rapid urbanization, rising disposable income and a young population push the aviation sector from 14m domestic passengers in 2013 to 144m, India would need a civil aviation infrastructure and capability that would be able to support a $20t economy by 2047, Scindia said. India’s air passenger traffic increased 47% year-on-year to 123.2m passengers in 2022, almost 15% lower to 2019. Speaking at an aviation event in New Delhi this week, Scindia said the civil aviation infrastructure in India has grown from 74 airports in 2013 to 148 airports waterdomes and heliports today. India’s six metro cities – Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Kolkata and Hyderabad – today have a capacity of close to 192m passengers. “In the next four years these cities will have a capacity of 420m passengers per year,” Scindia said. He further said that by the end of this year Delhi Airport will grow from the current 70m to 100m passengers. Talking about increasing fleet size to accommodate a growing number of air passengers, Scindia also he expects India’s fleet to grow from the present 700 to over 2,000 planes in the next five to seven years. The minister also cited Air India’s record order of 470 aircraft touted as the largest order in international civil aviation history.<br/>

Airports of Thailand plans to invest 36.8b baht ($1.08b) to expand its low-cost terminal at Bangkok’s Don Mueang Airport and increase passenger capacity and boost tourism income, it said late on Wednesday. Construction will begin this year and take until 2029, AOT said in a statement, adding the expansion would increase its handling capacity from 30m passengers to 40m per year. The project can “increase national income as a whole such as income from tourism, income from service sector related to tourism,” AOT said. The statement said the investment included 12 aircraft parking stands and 11 jet bridges. AOT said it would use operating cash flow for the investment. The state-owned firm operates six international airports in Thailand, including the country’s main Suvarnabhumi Airport, which can handle 45m passengers annually.<br/>

More than 10,000 aviation workers, including those in operational, training and management roles, will be polled as part of a sector-wide survey that will, for the first time, track changes to safety culture. The aim of the new survey is to help aviation companies understand how their employees view and value safety, and which areas can be improved, said the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) on Thursday. The survey will be conducted annually, which will allow CAAS to identify new trends. The findings from the first poll will be released in September, setting a baseline for future comparisons. About 400 companies, including airlines, ground handlers, maintenance firms, training organisations and freight forwarders, will be involved. The authority had conducted a similar survey in 2021, but it was of a smaller scale and focused more on the impact of Covid-19 on safety practices and mindsets. In that poll, more than 90% of the 1,347 respondents said safety remained a priority despite the upheavals caused by the pandemic. They also said there was a need to create a better environment where staff feel safe to report mistakes – an area CAAS said it would work with companies on.<br/>

Canadian business jet maker Bombardier Inc on Thursday raised its 2025 revenue and free cash flow targets at its investor day, capitalizing on strong demand for private flights. Montreal-based Bombardier said it is now targeting more than $9b in annual revenue by 2025, up from an earlier objective for that year of about $7.5b. Bombardier’s full-year revenue reached $6.9b in 2022. The company is now expected to generate more than $900m in free cash flow, a closely watched metric, by 2025, up from earlier estimates of greater than $500m. Corporate jet makers have reported swelling order backlogs on persistent strong demand for private flying, especially in the United States, the world’s largest market for business aviation. But while demand continues to be strong, supply chain snags and fears of a recession remain headwinds. Bombardier also said it anticipates tripling its revenues from defense sales and services to more than $1b in the second half of the decade.<br/>

When Eric Martel returned to Bombardier Inc. in the spring of 2020, the company was hardly recognizable from the one he’d left five years earlier. Bombardier had just sold its two biggest divisions, which built commercial jets and trains, in a desperate, sell-anything-you-can effort to raise money. A new viral disease called Covid-19 was ripping around the globe, forcing governments to lock down and throwing the world economy into recession. Bombardier’s factories went silent. “The company was in a very, very precarious situation,” Martel, 55, said during an interview in a lounge overlooking the firm’s jet finishing plant, near Montreal’s international airport. Today, his task is no longer merely to keep the aerospace firm solvent. It’s to convince investors he has a credible plan for real growth, whatever happens in the economy. Bombardier announced more ambitious financial targets on Thursday, aiming for at least $9b in revenue and $900m in free cash flow in 2025. That’s up from previous goals of $7.5b and $500m, respectively. The shares have risen nearly sixfold since he took over as CEO, a relief rally as the company made progress on paying down its towering debts. “We hit the bottom of the slope in 2020, and we are going back up,” said Martel. Bombardier’s slide toward the brink of bankruptcy was triggered by its decision to challenge Boeing and Airbus with the C Series commercial aircraft program. It became a sinkhole: development costs went way over budget at $6b and the company was forced to offload it to Airbus, which renamed the jet the A220. That was merely one stage in a yearslong fire sale that also led Bombardier to divest its huge train-making division to France’s Alstom SA in early 2020. Soon after it was announced, Alain Bellemare departed as CEO. It was up to Martel to finish the Alstom deal and two others and get the cash in the hangar. “There were three major transactions that were put into question in the context of Covid,” he said. “There were challenges, and we closed them all.”<br/>