|
Airbus Will Continue Focus on Long-Haul Services
Airlines will continue to focus their long-haul services on large hubs, Airbus believes. It isn’t denying that point-to-point, direct-air service will grow, says Laurent Rouaud, vp of market forecasts and research, but the hub-to-hub and hub-to-point service that will generate a 20-year market for 1,250 large passenger aircraft will both grow faster.
Rouaud’s team has looked at Official Airline Guide (OAG) numbers for the past 32 years, and they show a closely parallel growth of seats offered on hub-to-hub and hub-to-point routes over 2000 nmi. Point-to-point traffic, by contrast, has stayed relatively flat. Fragmentation — services completely bypassing major hubs — will occur, but Rouaud says that there is also a trend to consolidation — which allows airlines to build networks and dominate their hubs, and provides the logic behind global alliances.
On the Pacific, Rouaud points out, the number of city pairs served has expanded, from 47 routes in 1994 to 73 routes today. Hub-to-point services have expanded at a higher rate than hub-to-hub flights, which Airbus expects to continue. But, Rouaud’s projections show, hub-to-hub traffic will still be three times larger than hub-to-point in 2014, supporting the need for very large aircraft. Existing customers have already planned 250 weekly A380 frequencies into northeast Asia by 2010. Overall, says Rouaud, Asia-Pacific carriers are expected to account for 62% of passenger A380 sales.
Cargo traffic is even more concentrated than passenger traffic, Rouaud maintains, and is likely to remain so. “Eighty percent of air cargo tonne-miles will be long-range, intercontinental, hub to hub,” he says, citing figures that show that 42% of all air freight moves through the top 10 airports. There has been a particularly sharp growth — 430% — in high-technology goods shipped from Asia to the U.S. between 1995-2003, and the A380, with dual decks and less tendency to bulk out than other freighters, is well placed to carry it. Airbus also notes that the top 10 cargo carriers have 55% of the market, and that the six largest carriers are all A380 or A380F customers.
Airbus has calibrated its forecasts against 12 other teams — aircraft manufacturers and suppliers, consultants and academics. “Only one of them,” says Rouaud, “expects the average size of aircraft to decline.” No prizes for guessing which.
back
to ShowNews home
|
