Patrick Whyte, Skift
Ryanair is the great white shark of the airline world. It knows which airlines are bleeding cash and it is in the mood to feast.
3 days ago
Richard Weiss, Bloomberg
It looks like Lufthansa is caught up in the greater wave of labor strife cropping up across Germany. After canceling half its flights scheduled for Tuesday, the airline has to hope this is an isolated incident.
1 month ago
Brian Sumers, Skift
The bureaucracy at a major legacy airline often rivals that of a government. So when Lufthansa Group decided it needed an innovation hub, it purposely built it in Berlin, far from the main headquarters. That was probably a good idea.
2 months ago
Richard Weiss , Bloomberg
This is more notable than it looks. Legacy airlines in the past were known for keeping high-profile unprofitable routes for years, if only to save face. But here, Lufthansa cut the route remarkably quickly — the definition of "fail fast."
Ryanair and EasyJet have both used the demise of Air Berlin to boost their operations in Germany. You get the feeling that we'll be hearing a lot more from Lufthansa's low-cost unit Eurowings in the coming years.
Jonathan Stearns and Benjamin Katz, Bloomberg
Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary said "the first industry over the cliffs will be flights" in a Brexit deal, and then perhaps the UK would reexamine its decision. That's not a bad idea at all.
Airlines have long hoped for a technological development that would enable them to take back control from travel's middlemen. The New Distribution Capability was supposed to be that solution, but change of this magnitude takes time. At the moment, the British Airways parent seems more than happy to eat up the cost.
3 months ago
Air France-KLM is being much more cautious than its rivals on the subject of low-cost long-haul. Joon isn't the long-term answer and Air France-Klm needs to come up with something better if it is going to compete against Norwegian and others.
British Airways parent IAG was the odds-on favorite to take over Niki and merge it with low-cost carrier Vueling. It will be interesting to see whether Thomas Cook emerges as Niki Lauda’s mystery backer.
4 months ago
Yes, Air Berlin was ostensibly competition for Lufthansa. But for a long time, Air Berlin was a weakened competitor. Now that Easyjet has taken over some of Air Berlin's assets, the German market could be transformed.
5 months ago
Despite all the bad headlines, Ryanair continues to dominate the short-haul European market. The performance – though slightly down on previous years – should also help take some of the heat off Chief Executive Michael O’Leary.
Grant Martin, Skift
With the change by Lufthansa Group, travelers in Europe will have to adjust to the new normal in loyalty programs.
