Factfile

Organisation: oneworld

Headquarters: Vancouver, Canada

Website: www.oneworld.com 

Year founded: February 1, 1999

Members: American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Finnair, Iberia, Japan Airlines, LAN, Malév, Mexicana, Qantas, Royal Jordanian, S7. Members elect are airberlin, Kingfisher, Malaysia Airlines. 

What has the transition been like for you from leading airlines to leading an alliance? 

Virtually seamless, from my perspective. I had a good deal of experience of working in the alliance arena in the past with various airlines – including taking US Airways into the Star Alliance and then representing US Airways in its interaction with Star. So alliance work is familiar to me, although of course our airline members bring their own individual cultures and perspectives. You never stop learning in business or in life.

What was the thinking behind moving oneworld’s headquarters to New York?

Being in New York enables oneworld to put its finger right on the pulse of one of the world’s biggest business travel markets – and, with oneworld’s primary focus on the international business traveller, that yields benefits. New York is also a city served by more flights by more oneworld airlines than anywhere else, so it is easy to travel there from all of our member airlines’ home bases, and vice versa. Oneworld is sharing offices there with New York teams from nearly all our member airlines, and that too will enable us to work more closely and effectively with some of our key contacts at our carriers.

From a network perspective what have been the most interesting developments over the past year?

Two key developments – closer working links between our member airlines and our membership expansion. It has been a breakthrough year in terms of our member carriers working more closely together.

Our airlines operating across the North Atlantic gained antitrust immunity to be able to cooperate in the way in which their competitors have been operating for years. American Airlines, British Airways and Iberia very quickly launched their joint business, which has allowed them to schedule together, enabling them to offer more frequent services on many key routes between the USA and Europe and to launch flights in a number of new markets, like New York–Budapest, Chicago–Helsinki, Madrid–Los Angeles and London–San Diego.

Across the North Pacific, American Airlines and Japan Airlines have now also started working together in a similar way, enabling JAL, for instance, to launch its first new service to North America in around two decades, with its new service to Boston. In the South Pacific, American and Qantas are now deepening their links too, paving the way for the Australian airline to launch one of the world’s longest commercial flights – between the two airlines’ Sydney and Dallas/Fort Worth hubs.

In terms of membership expansion, oneworld added Russia’s leading domestic carrier S7 Airlines in November and we now have Kingfisher Airlines, India’s premier carrier, and airberlin and Malaysia Airlines lining up to join. These four airlines expand oneworld’s network by around 25%, adding some 250 destinations to our map in some of the world’s key regions for business travel.

How has the unrest in the Middle East and Africa affected the alliance?

Not significantly overall. We were the first alliance to add an airline from that part of the world, with Royal Jordanian joining in 2007. Jordan has not been embroiled in the Arab Spring events in the way that many other countries in that part of the world have been.

S7 – what does a Russian carrier bring to the alliance?

S7 is not just any Russian carrier – it is the leading airline in the region, not just in terms of passengers carried and destinations served but also in being the first there to adopt an all-Western fleet and in adopting things like online reservations and check-in, for instance, as well as offering an international-standard quality service. Russia is one of the world’s biggest countries. It is also a region where business travel is predicted to grow fastest. So oneworld now has the best airline from that part of the world to take advantage of those opportunities.

How important is the integration of airberlin into oneworld?

Airberlin is Europe’s sixth biggest airline these days. It provides oneworld with one of Europe’s fastest growing and most popular airlines – a hybrid carrier offering quality service at real value prices. Its German home is Europe’s biggest economy. So airberlin gives oneworld access to that market and a really attractive network throughout Central Europe. We are very much looking forward to welcoming it on board in early 2012 – just ahead of the opening of the Brandenburg International Airport at its Berlin home, which is set to be Europe’s newest hub, with huge potential.

BA and Iberia have their well-publicised list of airlines that they are supposedly interested in acquiring. How would a period of acquisition impact on oneworld, if at all?

The merger of British Airways and Iberia solidified the relationship between two of our biggest member airlines at a time when enhanced alliance cooperation is higher up the agenda of all airlines than ever before. However, it did not materially affect the businesses of our other members or result in any changes to our global alliance priorities. 

What is the greatest challenge facing oneworld in the year ahead?

We have three great airlines to bring on board, Kingfisher Airlines, airberlin and Malaysia Airlines, and we face the constant challenge of ensuring we deliver the best quality alliance service to our customers.

How does oneworld manage the relationship with airports where you have co-location projects? 

One of oneworld’s key customer promises is that we make it easier to connect between our member airlines’ networks, making it smoother and simpler for people to reach more places, beyond the reach of any individual airline. A good transfer experience at our key hubs is vital in delivering that. To this end, our aim is to bring the operations of our member airlines together wherever opportunities exist and where it makes sense to do so. We’ve made great progress in that area by introducing oneworld transfer centres in recent months – at airports including London Heathrow, Madrid and Tokyo, and we have a very exciting list of additional transfer centres to be introduced in the coming months and years.

You are one of the most highly awarded airline alliances – what sets you apart from the rest? 

We think there are two main reasons – the great scope and quality of oneworld’s member airlines, who number among the best from each region of the world, and the quality of oneworld’s outstanding record of delivery on our alliance promises. We are determined to maintain that quality approach in everything we do going forward.