[TominScotland]

Is BT’s report on EK profits (https://www.businesstraveller.com/business-travel/2017/05/11/emirates-group-profits-70-per-cent/ ) indicative of a blip or something more significant?

[Charles-P]

In my view Emirates is now stabilising after years of unsustainable massive growth. The product in Business is superb in my view and the hub at Dubai makes so much sense for many flights.

[Tom Otley]

[quote quote=803758]Having lived & worked in both Dubai & Abu Dhabi & knowing quite a few “connected” people, I understand that a merger of EK/EY has been discussed. Not by “management” (who have no true deciton-making powers at this level) but by the real decision makers. The rulers of Dubai & Abu Dhabi. For now its not happening. Too much of a loss of face but could easily be on the cards for the long term. EY just don’t have the presence of EK (and are in heavy, heavy cost cutting mode) & came to the party far too late. EK made the wrong fleet choices without sufficient considerations for the long term flexibility required (changing market/political landscape) which is so typical in the region. QR, are well placed to capitalise on the EK/EY dilemma, with a clever choice of fleet & VERY deep pockets (although cost-cutting is evident to some extent). Winners? QR!
[/quote]

Restarted again

Emirates chief open to working closely with Etihad

“Emirates is open to cooperation with Etihad Airways on areas including procurement, its president Tim Clark said on Wednesday, adding a full merger between the pair was unlikely but up to the owners.

“I think there is value to be had working more closely with them,” Mr Clark said.

“There are many areas that the airlines could work together on, like procurement. But we have to go the first jump first to understand what it is we could do and I’m simply the manager of one of the businesses,” he said.

“It is my superiors who have to make that call, not me.”

When asked if the pair could pursue a merger along the lines of Europe’s Air France and KLM, Mr Clark said: “I don’t think that will be the case but it is not my call really. It is whatever [the shareholders] may do in the future.”

[MarcusGB]

I also covered this issue in terms of a more detailed look at Etihad’s decline in service on the other post on here re Etihad cuts.

Perhaps we should look at poor old Gulf Air, from where it once was to now, and with Qatar being “out of favour” with the other Arab states, unless this changes and the restrictions being placed upon the country and Airline, if does not look good for them.
Having said that, the locality of EK / EY’s hubs so close together around 73 miles, seems rather too cramped to sustain. Abu Dhabi’s new airport, and Etihad’s hub, has been pushed back 2 years, already desperately needed by Etihad.
I think Etihad, may well be the one that is clearly going in the wrong direction, no longer profitable, cutting back, poor decisions strategically. Look at their failures and losses with Alitalia and Air berlin?

My Loyalty is going back to Asianic based Airlines, and particluar Alliances and KLM / AF rather than the ME3.
They feel they need no such Alliances, and stand on their own, but in the long run, i think we are seeing this does not enhance loyalty.
The arrogance with which EK swept through Europe, and Asia Pacific, cutting fares with huge Aircraft, angered many countries and people, and affected many Airlines. Such as reduction of Air New Zeland by EK running services ex all the Australia cities, carrying on into Auckland, thereby taking business of the Tasman routes. Similar in Germany with Court cases with LH government, and EK re fares and capacity.

Think of the boost to other carriers, if EK or EY were pulled out of LHR tomrw?!!!

[capetonianm]

The arrogance with which EK swept through Europe, and Asia Pacific, cutting fares with huge Aircraft, angered many countries and people, and affected many Airlines. Such as reduction of Air New Zeland by EK running services ex all the Australia cities, carrying on into Auckland, thereby taking business of the Tasman routes. Similar in Germany with Court cases with LH government, and EK re fares and capacity.
Think of the boost to other carriers, if EK or EY were pulled out of LHR tomrw?

I couldn’t agree more, and I question how the civil aviation authorities of those affected countries, supported by their national carriers, have not tried to enforce a reduction of EK’s services.
The opposite appears to happening.

[paulkaz]

Unlike European markets which have a high degree of political nationalism when facing the multitude of ME3 services Aus and Nz passengers were grateful for a better servic and not particularly loyal to local carriers Both international trading markets are largely unrestricted so we have adjusted to the end of many local industries and the replacement with better imports such as the clothing and car industries. Airlines are the same.
Qf has 1 syd lhr 380 service the me3 7. Qf should regain passengers with the Sin stop over for convenience. No one here bemoans the unfair competition but rather expects Qf to match the me3. Thankfully Qf s profits show they have cherry picked markets around the me3 and got closer to their level of service.x

[SimonS1]

[quote quote=834055]Unlike European markets which have a high degree of political nationalism when facing the multitude of ME3 services Aus and Nz passengers were grateful for a better servic and not particularly loyal to local carriers Both international trading markets are largely unrestricted so we have adjusted to the end of many local industries and the replacement with better imports such as the clothing and car industries. Airlines are the same. Qf has 1 syd lhr 380 service the me3 7. Qf should regain passengers with the Sin stop over for convenience. No one here bemoans the unfair competition but rather expects Qf to match the me3. Thankfully Qf s profits show they have cherry picked markets around the me3 and got closer to their level of service.x
[/quote]

Exactly. You get a handful of people parroting the same old agendas but in the real world many governments are delighted with the extra traffic (both passengers and cargo) that the ME3 have brought.

Of course the bloated old flag carriers moan and groan, particularly in the US, but they would, wouldn’t they? The joy of a hub and spoke model is that there is life outside of places like London and you can compete offer a genuine choice to the likes of London Airways.

I seem to recall there was a bit of traffic noise when EK introduced their 4th daily to JNB, in practice it has grown the passenger numbers, been good for the local economy and of course it’s not as if the management of SAA are sufficiently competent to do it themselves anyway.

No different to when the locos started opening service to regional airports in Europe 10 years or more ago. Plenty of bluster from the legacy airlines about the deals being cut etc, however in reality the communities themselves were delighted at the economic stimulus they were seeing.

Thankfully with a few exceptions the days of political protectiinism, fixed capacity and/or collusion on fares are all gone and open skies is in most cases the way forward.

[MarcusGB]

Just been informed from another travel reviiew site, that Etihad have had a catastrophic failure during their “Guest program ” upgrade!
(Loyaltylobby.com)
“Etihad in Disarray when Guest Program Loses All/ Most Email during IT Upgrade!”

Many emails / addresses have been removed for accounts, and other data on their members has been completely lost, and passwords also wiped.
it means sending an email to the new interface to replace your password with a code, to your registered email address, which the Airline database no longer has!

Yet another failure, and chasing up responses for the Robotic answers just became even less likely.

A falling decline in every single aspect of the Airline!
Loyalty Lobby describe it as “Typical Etihad Incompetence, and cheapest providor upgrade with disastrous conqeuences!

I am pleased i have left them!
If one of the ME3 are going to fail, to me it looks like Etihad is clearly failing in every aspect, and most likely to go.

[AussieJohn]

Will be very interesting to see how (and maybe if) they recover from this massive snafu.

I saw the post this morning on Loyalty Lobby and immediately thought that if they don’t fix this and fix it fast, then they are in big trouble. It will be making headlines round the world I suspect, and surely the Emir of Abu Dhabi will be demanding answers, as it does not reflect well on the country. I note also that Khalifa is also the President of UAE, so maybe he will hasten a merger of airlines after this mess.

[Mark Caswell]

Etihad has today announced it will drop flights to Dallas next year, citing AA’s decision to end codeshare agreements between the carriers:

Etihad to drop Dallas route

[canucklad]

Interesting and excellent points, many have been covered before, but I’m going to question whether or not anyone can really predict where the ME3 or 4 if you include TK , will be in 15 years’ time.

Firstly, their finances……And this is written with envy, as my famous team perpetually struggles …..Name an airline , apart from the ME3, anywhere else in the world that has an endless treasure chest to chuck at football teams. The recent Neymar transfer reeks of cross subsidising to flout rules, And how successful would Man City be without Etihad’s sponsorship.. I’d suggest that the first signs of financial strife with the ME3 will surface at this level.

Secondly, and selfishly I welcome the ME3 ‘s confidence and faith in our regions. . and in particular their investment in EDI has clearly paid off. Reminds me of the film “Field of Dreams” .
Where once you could see BA staff wearing their uniforms with pride, ,that’s now been replaced with the colours of Qatar and Etihad . So long may they be successful.

Sadly though, back to my original point. The realization that we are now living in an era, now more unstable than it has been for many years for many reasons. Then remind ourselves, theprimary global reasons why we are where we are, and you can’t help but conclude that the ME4 are right in the middle of the cauldron of instability..

Never mind 15 years from now, as far as the ME3 are concerned we’re only ever 24 hours away from not predicting how successful their going to be. As the management team at TK have found out to their cost recently.

[transtraxman]

It is surprising what has been mentioned so far.
Turkish (Istanbul), Emirates (Dubai), Etihad (Abu Dhabi) and Qatar(Doha).
If we look at the rest of the Gulf the already mentioned Gulf Air (Bahrain) and Oman Air (Muscat) have also to be taken into consideration. Yet there is one pioneering airline which suffered a lot in the regional conflicts, Kuwait Airways. Each has its niche and I am sure the Sheiks, Emirs and local governments will want to maintain their airlines with their market quotas.No loss of face means no radical change – just a movement of the pieces on the chessboard.

What has already been talked about is a link up between FlyDubai (as a regional airline) and Emirates as a long haul airline.This could probably solve the question of different types of markets needing different types of aircraft. I believe the talks are more than just exploratory.

Another airline to be taken into account is Air Arabia based in the UAE. This airline has subsidiaries(bases) in Egypt, Morocco, and Jordan. Would this not be an ideal candidate for Etihad to merge with? Thus the problem of passenger feeds and destinations can be solved.

When all is said and done we are only talking about the Gulf carriers (plus Turkish). In the meantime others, such as Aeroflot, are getting their act together to take advantage of the travel concepts.
Whatever happens in the next 10-15 years, we will find the market in a different situation.Some airlines and hubs will have bettered their position while others will have declined (e.g. like LHR).

[Inquisitive]

Very wishful thinking that ME3 will fade away – very similar to the thinking that BA J class will be similar to other top airlines one day!
Emirates and Etihad might merge, but there is FAT chance that they will fail. Just consider Alitalia is still running.
The fact is that ME3 went to new places that facilitated passenger growth. Also they keep their focus on both premium and economy passengers.

[FDOS_UK]

[quote quote=835382]Interesting and excellent points, many have been covered before, but I’m going to question whether or not anyone can really predict where the ME3 or 4 if you include TK , will be in 15 years’ time.[/quote]

Absolutely right – 15 years is nearly a generation, way too far in the future to take a view, not just for airlines, but for most businesses.

[TominScotland]

BT’s report on the Qatar acquisition of 9.6% of Cathay Pacific (https://www.businesstraveller.com/business-travel/2017/11/06/qatar-airways-acquires-nearly-10-per-cent-cathay-pacific/) is very interesting, especially as they have a similar holding in IAG. In theory this should herald closer co-operation beyond oneworld between QR, CX, BA and IB but will this happen in practice?

[Author]

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