Swiss Review 1/2018

13 Swiss Review / January 2018 / No.1 sel. At the bi-national Euro Airport serving the Basel region, the company is even the clear market leader with a market share of around 60 %. It is fascinating to see how the business models of easyJet and Swiss have increasingly aligned in the short-haul market. easyJet previously adopted amodel based on simplicity – no transfer traffic, no extra services and the lowest prices whenever pos- sible. This stance has gradually sof- tened. easyJet has, for example, intro- duced categories of seating in the cabin. Passengers sitting at the front or in seats with more legroom pay more. Changeable tickets are really expensive, even with easyJet. The air- line hopes this category will attract more business customers requiring flexible travel times. Conversely, Swiss, which tends to be more expen- sive, has launched extremely low- price deals to avoid being squeezed out of the market, particularly in Ge- neva where Swiss is in direct compe- tition with easyJet. Edelweiss increases the size of its fleet It is not just Swiss and easyJet who are performing well at themoment, Edel- weiss Air is too. The only Swiss “lei- sure travel airline” – as it calls itself – is a sister company of Swiss, so it is also part of the Lufthansa group and cooperates closely with Swiss. It will add five aeroplanes to its fleet this year, taking the total to 15. There are three classes of seat on long-haul flights – Eco, Eco Plus and Business. However, there are also examples of companies struggling. Air Berlin and Darwin Air from Lugano, which went into liquidation last year, illus- trate that survival cannot be taken for granted even in a strong economy. Air Berlin, which operated several routes to Switzerland and also had aircraft based in Zurich, suffered from the lack of a clear business pro- file coupled with notoriously high costs. The upshot was firstly admin- istration proceedings and then the withdrawal of its operating licence. The name Darwin, which alludes to the fight for survival in nature, be- came a symbolic beacon for the small airline from Ticino which belonged to the Air Adria group. Darwin Air was founded in 2003 after Swiss re- moved Lugano from its network of routes. Ironically, Darwin also later abandoned the destination of Lugano as part of restructuringmeasures. Its operational hub was in Geneva and its headquarters in Lugano. Last-minute salvation Berne-based Skywork was in a peril- ous situation last autumn. Undaunted, the small airline from Berne is at- tempting to develop regular services but the lack of infrastructure – small hangars formaintenancework and no blind landing facilities in the event of poor weather conditions – mean it is working under tight constraints. And aeroplanes with fewer than 50 seats are barely financially viable with cur- rent pricing structures. Skywork only narrowly escaped closure when the Federal Office of Civil Aviation demanded additional financial guarantees. Last autumn, an investor was apparently found at the last minute to save the company. It is likely to operate more from Euro Air- port in Basel in future. The aircraft op- erated by Skywork flew out of Basel once before around 20 years ago, when they belonged to Crossair’s large fleet of Saab 2000s. Ever more air travellers 2018 should be another good year for flying. The economy is picking up in more or less all parts of the world, creating a very good climate for air- lines. The sector association IATA es- timates that the number of air travel- lers will increase by around 6 % in 2018, which means that 4.3 billion people will board an aeroplane this year. The increasing demand also means that Swiss is set to continue growing. Before the end of the year, the airline announced at its annual press conference that it would create around 550 new jobs by the end of 2018. STEFAN SCHUPPLI IS A JOURNALIST AND AVIATION EXPERT BASED IN BASEL Swiss airlines (as at the end of 2017) Employees Aircraft Swiss 9100 * 75 Edelweiss Air 670 10 easyJet Switzerland 550/340 ** 14/9 ** Skywork 100 4 * End of 2016 **Geneva/Basel