Thesis (Ph.D.)--Oregon State University, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 106-112). Also available online.

Thesis (M. of Strategic Studies)--U.S. Army War College, 2006. / "15 MAR 2006"--Tech. report doc. page. Includes bibliographical references (p. 15-16) Full text document available on public STINET.

O mercado de baixa renda tem se tornado cada vez mais relevantes para todos os setores empresariais. Estima-se que em 2010 as classes C e D serão responsáveis por mais da metade do consumo do mercado interno brasileiro. Empresas de transporte aéreo brasileiras de passageiros, que historicamente se caracterizaram por prestar serviço voltado para as classes de maior renda, passaram a desenvolver estratégias para atrair o público de baixa renda para viajar de avião, partindo de estratégias concebidas em outras indústrias e adaptando às particularidades do setor aéreo. O presente trabalho identificou as estratégias de empresas aéreas brasileiras para atender o mercado de baixa renda. Devido ao fato do mercado de baixa renda para o transporte aéreo ser ainda embrionário, as estratégias se concentra ainda no composto mercadológico, como produto, preço, canal de distribuição, comunicação e serviço. Práticas adotadas pelo varejo para atrair e reter o consumidor de baixa renda, como a loja de vizinhança, porta a porta, meios de financiamento alternativos ao cartão de crédito tem sido testadas e adotadas pelas empresas aéreas analisadas, complementando as práticas usuais do mercado. Essa pesquisa avaliou ainda os principais fatores indutores e restritivos à inserção da baixa renda no setor de transporte aéreo. A maior preocupação das empresas aéreas analisadas nesse estudo é com a infra-estrutura aeroportuária, que pode se tornar limitador da expansão do setor aéreo no Brasil. Já as operadoras de turismo são percebidas pelas empresas aéreas como agente indutor à inserção da população de baixa renda, em especial pela venda de pacotes de turismo. Finalmente, essa pesquisa avaliou, ainda que de maneira sucinta as estratégias de negócio adotadas pelas empresas aéreas, e identificou um modelo de baixo custo brasileira. Trata-se de um modelo híbrido entre as estratégias de diferenciação e baixo custo. As empresas analisadas procuram simultaneamente oferecer serviços para clientes corporativos e estimular novos mercados, sobretudo o mercado de baixa renda. De acordo com Porter (1985), esse tipo de estratégia poderia ser classificado como meio-termo, visto que a empresa não adota nenhuma das estratégias genéricas. Porém, o histórico dessas empresas permite avaliar que essas empresas iniciaram sua operação com modelo mais próximo à estratégia de baixo custo, e tiveram que evoluir ou reformular completamente esse modelo de acordo com as características do mercado brasileiro. / The Bottom of Pyramid has become increasingly relevant market to all business sectors. It is estimated that in 2010 social classes C and D will account for over half the consumption of the Brazilian domestic market. Brazilian airlines, who have historically been characterized by providing service for the high income classes, began to develop strategies to attract lowincome public to travel by plane, using strategies developed in other industries and adapting to the particularities of the airline industry. This research has identified strategies for Brazilian airlines to reach the Bottom of Pyramid market. As this segment is still limit, strategies still focus on the marketing mix, such as product, price, distribution channel, communication and service. Practices adopted by retailers to attract and retain low-income consumers, as the neighborhood store, door to door, alternative financing to credit card have been tested and adopted by the airlines studied, complementing the usual practices of the market. This research also evaluated the main factors that affect the introduction of Bottom of Pyramid in the airline industry. The major concern of airlines examined in this study is with the airport infrastructure, which can limit the expansion of the airline industry in Brazil. Tour operators are already perceived by the airlines as a promoter for this process. Finally, this research evaluated the business strategies adopted by airlines, and identified a Brazilian low-cost model. The model is a hybrid between the strategies of differentiation and low cost. The analyzed airlines are seeking to offer services to both corporate customers and stimulate new markets, particularly the Bottom of Pyramid. According to Porter (1985), this strategy could be classified as stuck in the middle, because the company does not adopt any of the generic strategies. However, the history of these companies can assess that these companies started their operation with model closer to the strategy of low cost, and they had to evolve or completely redesign this model according to the characteristics of the Brazilian market

The thesis introduces the airline industry and its interconnection with marketing on social medias. At the beginning, in the theoretical part, particularities of the industry explaining the necessity of any kind of marketing are stated. Definitions and categorization of social medias follow together with a detailed description of four of them which will be part of the later analysis. Characteristics of users are mentionned as well since they are highly important for the right segmentation and targeting. The practical part contains the analysis of usage of the chosen medias in marketing of the selected european airlines. It presents popularity of each airline and then it focuses on the most favourite ones with a purpose to reveal reasons of this favour. One chapter is dedicated to successful viral campaigns with recommendations for their formation. At the end, the thesis is summarized and the results of the analysis and suggestions for the future topic extension are added.

The writer purposes in this study to make a survey of the airline industry in the United States from 1940 through 1946. Various phases of the development and present status of air commerce are to be dealt with, including historical growth of the airline industry, the present significance of air transportation in the nation, the federal regulation of airplanes, problems and services involved in commercial air transportation, the operation of airlines, and the future of air transportation.

This research was conducted to analyse the crisis communication strategy used by Helios Airways after its Flight CY522 crash on 14 August 2005. The objective of the study was: • to examine the communication strategies Helios Airways chose and implemented in order to satisfy the enquiries of stakeholders who had different interests during the crisis. The pre-crisis background of Helios Airways; events related to the crash of Flight CY522, Boeing 737; and events after the crash were discussed. Owing to this, the single case study research approach was followed in conducting this study. Seven main issues emerge from the analysis of the data obtained. • the issue of the safety culture of the airline as discussed by the investigators of the crash; • the issue of compensation and handling of victims’ families; • the issue of the pressurisation defect of the aircraft identified the day before its flight which was not fixed; • the issue of the failure of the Boeing aircraft manufacturer to separate the signal which indicates take-off problems from that of pressurisation problems; • the issue of the government of Cyprus suspending flights after the crash; • the issue of the government of Cyprus Civil Aviation Authority granting a name change for Helios Airways to Ajet; and • the issue of the European Aviation Safety Agency in banning flights of Helios Airways. Denying responsibility, hedging responsibility, making amends, ingratiation and eliciting sympathy strategies were discussed inline with the crash of Helios Airways Flight CY522. Due to the pressurisation defect of the aircraft identified the day before its flight on the 14 August 2005, which was not fixed, the safety culture of the Airline had been perceived by the Cypriot public as low. This together with the delay of the compensation of the victims’ families and the confusing communication strategies, resulted in a negative public image of the Airline. The public insisted on the government of Cyprus banning the flight routes of Helios Airways. Due to those issues, Helios Airways was obliged to change its name to Ajet. However, even after the name change, the public did not accept Helios Airways as an airline of choice. Instead, they continued defaming Ajet in different media. Finally, Ajet ceased all operations and filed for bankruptcy. The major finding of this study is that Helios Airways did not have a crisis communication plan prepared in advance, and as a result, Helios Airways failed to communicate with its stakeholders, mainly the victims’ families and the media, by implementing a mix of inaccurate strategies without knowing exactly those stakeholders’ impact and degrees of involvement. There was no accurate correlation between the investigation progress and results, and the strategies. This can be substantiated from the niche width theory, which explains specialist airlines, as in Helios Airways, tend not to have crisis communication plans prepared in advance and as a result, lack consistency in messages. The general public, the civil aviation authority, and the government perceived the crash to have resulted from the failure of the Airways to fix the pressurisation problems that was identified the day before the crash. This clearly indicates the weakness of the communication strategies and the communication department of the Airways in identifying the perception of the public, and the media and their involvement, and then to align its strategies with the actual circumstances. / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Communication Management / MCom / Unrestricted

This dissertation develops a process improvement method for service operations based on the Theory of Constraints (TOC), a management philosophy that has been shown to be effective in manufacturing for decreasing WIP and improving throughput. While TOC has enjoyed much attention and success in the manufacturing arena, its application to services in general has been limited. The contribution to industry and knowledge is a method for improving global performance measures based on TOC principles. The method proposed in this dissertation will be tested using discrete event simulation based on the scenario of the service factory of airline turnaround operations. To evaluate the method, a simulation model of aircraft turn operations of a U.S. based carrier was made and validated using actual data from airline operations. The model was then adjusted to reflect an application of the Theory of Constraints for determining how to deploy the scarce resource of ramp workers. The results indicate that, given slight modifications to TOC terminology and the development of a method for constraint identification, the Theory of Constraints can be applied with success to services. Bottlenecks in services must be defined as those processes for which the process rates and amount of work remaining are such that completing the process will not be possible without an increase in the process rate. The bottleneck ratio is used to determine to what degree a process is a constraint. Simulation results also suggest that redefining performance measures to reflect a global business perspective of reducing costs related to specific flights versus the operational local optimum approach of turning all aircraft quickly results in significant savings to the company. Savings to the annual operating costs of the airline were simulated to equal 30% of possible current expenses for misconnecting passengers with a modest increase in utilization of the workers through a more efficient heuristic of deploying them to the highest priority tasks. This dissertation contributes to the literature on service operations by describing a dynamic, adaptive dispatch approach to manage service factory operations similar to airline turnaround operations using the management philosophy of the Theory of Constraints.

Airline maintenance outsourcing is a common practice in the deregulation era of airline industry, and it mainly covers topics across technology, economics, and politics. This dissertation used an explanatory sequential mixed methods research to explore the effect of airline maintenance outsource on aviation safety. The first stage of the research was a quantitative research using a panel data analysis using five models to explore the statistical relationships between the independent variables: amount of outsourced maintenance, airline profitability, and real gross domestic product per capita, and dependent variables: aircraft accident rate and aircraft incident rate for the major U.S. Part 121 passenger air carriers between 1995 and 2019. The second qualitative research was interview with commercial aircraft maintenance professionals, airline manager, civil aviation regulators, and other key stakeholders to seek their interpretation about the first stage research results, opinions and understandings about the current commercial aircraft maintenance practice, and their expectations of the industry. Both stages of research confirmed that airline maintenance outsourcing does not affect aviation safety, and there is a positive relationship between airline financial performance and aviation safety performance. Consequently, airline maintenance outsourcing is not only economically sensible but also conducive to aviation safety if it is done properly. In the second stage research, the researcher found deficiencies in the current oversight system mainly due to lack of funding and personnel which needs to be addressed. The researcher recommended activity-based accounting to solve the funding issues about airline maintenance oversight and the future study can focus on decision-making process for airline maintenance outsourcing/insourcing based on empirical data.

Airlines wanting to cooperatively set prices for their international air travel service must apply to the relevant authorities for antitrust immunity (ATI). Whether consumers, on net, benefit from a grant of ATI to partner airlines has caused much public debate. This paper investigates the impact of granting ATI to oneworld alliance members on their price, markup, and various measures of cost. The evidence suggests that implementation of the oneworld alliance without ATI did not have a statistically significant impact on the markup of products offered by the members, and there is no evidence that the subsequent grant of ATI to various members resulted in higher markups on their products. We find evidence suggesting that the grant of ATI facilitated a decrease in partner carriers’ marginal and fixed costs. Furthermore, member carriers’ price did not increase (decreased) in markets where their services do (do not) overlap, implying that consumers, on net, benefit from the grant of ATI in terms of price changes.

The events of September 11,2001 followed by the oil price hike and the economic crisis of 2008, have lead to a drop in the demand for air travel. Airlines have attempted to return to profitability by cutting service in certain unattractive routes and airports. Simultaneously, delays and excess demand at a few major hubs have lead to airline introducing service at reliever airports. This dissertation attempts to capture the changes in the airline network by utilizing a supply-demand framework. / Ph. D.