Navigating Global Turbulence: Strengthening Collaboration in Aviation

Transcript

Richard Quest:Adrian, are you planning to run a bus service? No, we don't. You've got to admit, it's very— it's ingenious.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:It's very good. We actually ran bus services to get people across the border from the UAE to Oman when the hostilities broke out, but Oman has been open for all— at all times, and we haven't closed the airports or done anything like has been in the UAE and Kuwait. So it hasn't affected us, but we've run a lot of people cross-border.

Richard Quest:Now, for the next half hour, by this point, we all know the difficulties. We all know that you may run out of fuel or you may not run out of fuel. We all know that there may be a supply, there may not be a supply. We all know this, that it may get worse, it may not get worse. So I think we have to talk a little bit more about how you manage the environment And prepare for what comes next? Let's start with yourself.

Jiri Marek:We do the usual stuff. Like, I mean, it's very similar. We are pessimistic like COVID. The big difference is that in COVID, everybody was hit and everybody started to talk, we are in this together. Now everybody telling, dear airlines, deal with it. It's your problem, not ours. So we are talking with the suppliers. We are applying the fuel surcharge, but you cannot overprice yourself from market.

Richard Quest:What is your biggest problem at the moment?

Jiri Marek:We are not hedged.

Richard Quest:You're unhedged?

Jiri Marek:We are not.

Arjan Meijer:Thank you.

Richard Quest:What happened?

Jiri Marek:Well, we are 5 years in a profit, so we make certain measures. We have some buffers. We can observe, but we have strong balance sheet. But the question is, how long?

Richard Quest:Right. So this is a— are you hedged?

Jiri Marek:No. Let's go together.

Richard Quest:How much are you hedged?

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:We are hedged 80% for this year.

Richard Quest:Now, what I'm fascinated about, because I've heard— now we heard Tim's part of the hedge, we heard Ryanair's— not Ryanair, is hedged 75%. Sorry, Joe Faraday's hedge. How do we end up in an industry where airlines make such different decisions on something as crucial as the hedging of a— of something that is 30 to 35% of cost even on a good year?

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:It's about cash flow. I mean, you will always take the position, and if you want to hedge, then you've obviously got to pre-purchase those, and it takes a lot of money out of your balance sheet, and it is a lot of working capital that you must commit. For airlines, you know, we've got 18 aircraft. It is a cash hit that we'll take over the next 2 years that we honestly couldn't afford to do. So you take the point about spot fuel prices and 90% of the time, 80% of the time you do okay. And the time when you don't, like now, it hurts. We're double the fuel price.

Richard Quest:Do you, do you feel where in this environment, um, this is just one of those things that's happened? You know, we took the gamble and we lost against it. We could just as easily have won The lottery the other way around?

Jiri Marek:Well, I would say, especially with hedging, being the state-owned airline, it's always exactly the gamble. You might win, you might lose, but it's about fixing your budget cost. For us, up to now, it was always when is the right time because the fuel was going down. Now it's going up, but we will get through it.

Richard Quest:One more area on this and then we'll move on. How much is the fact that you're a state-owned airline with a deep pocket affected on that?

Jiri Marek:We are not asking the state aid.

Richard Quest:Not yet.

Jiri Marek:We plan not to.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:So we've—

Richard Quest:But you've just gone full state.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:No, we're not full state, we're 90% state. We still got 10%. We completed the transaction just over a month ago.

Richard Quest:Oh, well done. Yeah, thank you.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:It took us a year. It's nothing to do with access to state funding. I mean, the airline's expected to stand on its own, so we're funding this, you know, through increased pricing. The— we're applying a carrier surcharge for passengers to offset some of the fuel. We're swallowing the other part of it. We intend to obviously recover it over the coming months.

Richard Quest:When at Embraer, as you look at this crisis at the moment, it sort of doesn't affect you, but it does because it raises questions of fuel and of efficiency. It raises engine efficiency. All the issues that are thrown into sharp focus at a crisis. Not only do you have to deliver on what your deliverables are supposed to be, but if you've got a really good engine, you can now say to everybody else, haha, or a good— or particularly good aircraft, look, ours are much better than theirs.

Arjan Meijer:Well, we do to begin with, but— and we're not hedged, by the way, so we don't need that. But it definitely has a big impact on Embraer, right? I mean, we First of all, we've learned a lot from COVID what to do and what not to do. What we see is this will affect again the supply chains, and we had a lot of headache coming out of COVID resettling the supply chains, and still today we are struggling with, with that pain. So I think there's a lot of lessons to be learned from COVID going forward. I think that's, that's a very important point for Emirates.

Richard Quest:Sir Charles?

Arjan Meijer:I'd say twofold. One of them is we need to collaborate as an industry to make sure that we keep the demand going and we keep building the Now, that's, that's very important.

Richard Quest:Now, just stop for a second.

Arjan Meijer:Already stopped. I had 2 points.

Jiri Marek:He's the first one to telling that.

Richard Quest:Of course. What do you mean we've got to collaborate? I always get very suspicious when people say collaborate because it usually means do what I say.

Arjan Meijer:No, I don't think so. I think we collaborated also post-COVID, only that impact was so dramatic on the demand side that we had to collaborate with airlines to postpone some aircraft and get some aircraft delivered. I think it went both ways. If I take the other point, which is about cooperating with the supply chain, I think we learned a lot also from COVID how to work with the supply chain, not just with the key suppliers, but also with the secondary and the tertiary level. So we now have our people from, from our procurement team, for example, we have almost 50 people with suppliers and their suppliers and their suppliers to help them get back on track to pre-COVID levels. So I think that's something that we will keep doing. So it's not only with the customer.

Richard Quest:No, but how does the supply chain get affected by this? I mean, is it because— well, you tell me, how does the supply chain get affected so badly by what's happening at the moment?

Arjan Meijer:Um, well, it's, it's not as bad as we had during COVID that's for sure, right? So that was a completely different level. Yeah, but we have, we have supplies coming out of that region that, that are obviously affected ever since the turmoil broke out. So that will affect the systems. And the problem with our industry is we need all the parts of an airplane to build an aircraft. We can't build an aircraft with a few parts missing. So even if the impact is less, it is an impact on an industry that was already heavily struggling with the supply chain side.

Richard Quest:At Lufthansa Group, the largest in Europe, You're going to say something?

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:I'm just listening.

Richard Quest:All right. And all kinds of group. You have made various announcements in the last days about retiring of aircraft, cutting back the 20,000 flights, etc. And Sir Tim was extremely disparaging this morning about Those announcements and about why you were doing them and the way in which the group is responding. Do you have a response to him?

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Well, not to Tim, but I think what is now why we talk a lot about this crisis.

Richard Quest:All right, we're having difficulty with the gentleman's microphone. You've been saved.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:One, two. One, two.

Richard Quest:No, I think no.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Microphone's not on. I speak loud, so maybe you can hear me like this.

Richard Quest:I hope. We bring a hand mic, please. So, it's coming. Well, while we sort you out—

Jiri Marek:Is that the supply chain you were talking about?

Richard Quest:Yes, the supply chain's gone wrong.

Arjan Meijer:Immediate impact, see?

Richard Quest:Immediate impact, yeah.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Okay, now it's better. Yeah, good. So while we talk a lot about this crisis management today, and you said, you mentioned it, I think the key is now when, and we are in structural transformation for a while already before this crisis, so how we balance this now? How we spend, of course, the resources on managing the here and now and all these things mentioned, but also, and that's the key point, don't waste a crisis, a good crisis, and speed up the structural things that you have planned anyway. And these announcements, of course, were also related to that. So we are reacting to function of price, but also we are reacting to the structural change we want to do anyway. So when we actually bring less fleet types into the market than we had before, when we are doing turnaround for Lufthansa, when we are doing all these profit improvement programmes, when we are changing offers and orders, when we are changing also modern retailing for our customers, hopefully still a promise. These things we should not forget now in these days, and we need to speed it up actually while we have to manage the here and now.

Richard Quest:But Why is Lufthansa always being restructured? Well, I mean, you know, you at some point— sorry, I realize I'm in Germany, but at some point you've got to say it's not working very well.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Well, I— well, what is not very well? We have a good profit. I think we want to have a better profit, and you know, a medium term is 8 to 10%. We're not There, so we need to improve. But this industry since 40 years is in a restructuring mode. Tell me any airline that has just lived on its, on the, you know, on what they have. We're constantly doing it, everybody.

Richard Quest:But the Lufthansa margins, Swiss's margins are 10 times greater than LH's.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Yeah, that's a snapshot in time, but of course, um, our goal is that everybody has to contribute. Even Swiss will have to give, you know, improve their margin where they currently are, and they have been already better. So everybody will improve, hopefully. And Lufthansa has the biggest gap. That's why they have this big restructuring program more than the others have. But again, our industry is in a constant restructuring mode. We have crisis coming and going, but we need to restructure. Take the example of the old legacy systems we have since 50 years on the offers and orders. There's not a single airline that is right there, not a single airline is right there where we should be. So everybody needs to restructure.

Richard Quest:And you're restructuring, of course, you restructured your ownership structure.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:Yeah, we did the ownership structure. Before that, obviously, we put the airline back down the low-cost carrier path. It has slightly diverted from that. So we've spent 2 years rebuilding the airline. But to come back to restructuring, if I think of Formula 1 as a comparison, they will change tyres in 2 seconds, but they still look to improve. So you— no one can ever say their business is good enough. You should always keep trying to do better.

Richard Quest:No, but what's your role? What do you see as the role now? Because having restructured or having changed the ownership structure, not dramatically, but it, you know, and you have the full-service carrier as well. So essentially the government has 2 airlines.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:The government has 2 airlines.

Richard Quest:The government has 2 airlines. And I know Con runs an extremely strong operation Over at the full service. So where do you fit into it?

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:We fit in as the low-cost airline. There's routes and locations which don't fit for Oman Air. We've been a low-cost airline for the 9 years of our life. We have—

Richard Quest:Qatar, Qantas.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:That's an example this year, yeah. It's a very good scenario that you can build the lower base, which is a high-volume base that we can serve, and the higher-end full-service sphere that Oman Airserve. So we serve 2 very separate markets, 2 very distinct areas of operation.

Richard Quest:I'm going to come to the rest in a minute, but the difficulty is with this model traditionally, I mean, we learned in the last, later last decades that you can't really put a full service and a low cost together in the same group. It really doesn't work. Except in extremely unusual circumstances like Jetstar Qantas. Why would it work for you?

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:They're not in the same group. We are, you know, we're both owned by the government, but we're not in the same group. So we are, have different structures. The Minister of Transport, His Excellency, has been very clear.

Richard Quest:Ah, but Jetstar Qantas has the ability where the CEO of the group says, that's one of yours. Alan always said, Alan always said he sat there and, you know, when the children started fighting, Daddy would decide who got the toys.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:We hope we don't get to that point because there's so much opportunity in the Middle East and for our— and we're making a huge push into Africa. We don't overlap. We've moved down now. We only have 9 routes that overlap with each other. 7 are in India.

Richard Quest:Who's the daddy that decides?

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:His Excellency the Minister of Transport.

Richard Quest:What do you make of these muddles? I mean, as a, as a As a manufacturer, do you watch with some amusement as they all sort of shift round and change models? And, and you must secretly think, that's not going to work, or that's an interesting one.

Arjan Meijer:Well, we do. We have, we have quite sizable marketing departments that do a lot of these analyses. And I think to just talk about this is low cost and that's legacy, I think we've gone far beyond that point. Right? We see, we see mixed variants now. We see what happened in the USA where airlines were moving from one to another. Some do it successful, some don't. Europe is completely different than the US. And we also believe that where in the old days it always was low cost, it's you build a network based on an aircraft. We see also more low-cost carriers now looking at 2 different sizes of aircraft to do the same game. So that's also a variant. So It depends on the region. It depends on the, on the markets.

Richard Quest:Lufthansa Group. Someone I once heard described, and I once heard Alex describe it like Noah's Ark. You have 2 of everything within it in terms of planes, or you did have plane types of this and the other. How does the model now look? You've got the Lufthansa, Swiss, Austrian, Brussels, ITA, I'm sure of this, Eurowings, whatever that is.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Value carrier.

Richard Quest:Sorry?

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:A value carrier.

Richard Quest:Oh, what's a value carrier? Is that a new phrase?

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:That's the positioning for a long time already.

Richard Quest:Right, what's a value carrier?

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Well, you have really a very good cost position, but you have also quite a substantial offering on the customer side, which goes beyond what you maybe expect from other low-cost carriers.

Richard Quest:Are you a value carrier?

Jiri Marek:I think we are much higher than value carrier.

Richard Quest:I'm getting confused.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:So what the question is, what are we doing? So indeed, we are transforming and we're transforming from a group of airlines to an airline group, which means indeed where you have possibilities to bring the synergies together on the revenue side, on the customer-facing side, Plus what you can do behind the curtain on IT. That's what you bring together in the group. But you keep, you keep the USPs. And I said this this morning also, you keep the USPs of each carrier where you believe there is a value add for the customer— guest-facing hospitality experience. And these things you keep for Swissness, these things you keep for ITA, etc.

Richard Quest:You see, I get that, and I've argued this with Carsten, that I can see why it works from a nice touchy-feely point of view. Does it work from a revenue point of view and from a profitability point of view? Because you do not extract the full savings that you would say if you're united, American, one large brand.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Well, it's a different market, you know. It's— the US is a very homogeneous market. In Europe, it's very different. People expect also different experiences, they expect different products. There is things that Swiss people actually connect with Swiss International Airlines, and so on. So there is an expectation from the customer. It's not just because we believe that this is right. This is what the customer wants.

Richard Quest:If we look at yourself, how difficult is it as a smaller carrier against these behemoths?

Jiri Marek:Well, you always have some mosquitoes able to fly around the cow and get the food.

Richard Quest:So yeah, but the whole— if you're the mosquito, you get swatted or eventually somebody sort of puts a spray on you and that's the end of it.

Jiri Marek:Usually environment people will forbid those things. So, you know.

Richard Quest:Oh, so you're hoping the regulator's going to save you?

Jiri Marek:No, no, no, no. But look, honestly, we are small regional airline and I think when you are small, you can be more agile and you can do the things faster.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Right.

Richard Quest:But does your— I was going to say, does your success, but I'm going to go even more blunt. Does your survivability rely on not being fully— and, you know, people leaving you alone and not attacking you. Because if you face full frontal attack by Ryanair, by LH, by Group Alice, you will find it very difficult to succeed.

Jiri Marek:We have Wizz Air as our biggest competitor on our market. So I think it's the best challenge that if we can survive competing with Wizz, I believe we can survive competing with Lufthansa.

Richard Quest:Good point. What then do you require to succeed?

Jiri Marek:Like now, I think, as you mentioned, or Sabri mentioned, that every crisis is a good opportunity. We took opportunity in COVID, so we are already 70% above the COVID as a state airline. We take that opportunity and now the opportunity show up ourselves. Now there is enough aircraft on the market and there is also enough pilots on the market with this crisis. The fuel sooner or later will stabilize and I think we will take the opportunity of that.

Richard Quest:Let's go down the line on what— because I agree with you that, I mean, I hesitate to use the phrase since we're talking about a war, but, you know, war never wastes a crisis. War never wastes a crisis. So from your point of view, Mm-hmm. what does that mean involve when you sit down with your strategy people and you say, right, I need you to think the unthinkable?

Arjan Meijer:Well, first of all, I think what we've— well, first of all, I'm sitting with 3 airlines on the, on the bench here that either are operating E-Jets or that will operate E-Jets, right? So I think—

Richard Quest:Are you going to operate them?

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:Yeah, we have an order for 6.

Richard Quest:When do you get them?

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:When do I get them?

Jiri Marek:2028.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:Yeah.

Richard Quest:Is he going to get them on time?

Arjan Meijer:Of course.

Richard Quest:You sure?

Arjan Meijer:We're delivering on time. You should not— you should listen to all of them, right? We are delivering on time, Richard.

Richard Quest:Tom?

Arjan Meijer:Yeah, so we believe that crises are not good for the industry. That's clear, right? So that's why we are—

Richard Quest:You can't help that. So that's a given.

Arjan Meijer:But beyond the crisis, we believe that we already with the E2, we have an aircraft that is a natural hedge because the fuel burn is 30% lower than it's— than the aircraft that we had before this. So I believe that's an excellent aircraft. It not only delivers extremely low cost, but it allows airlines to focus on trip costs rather than seat cost. We always say it's great to have the lowest seat cost, but if no one sits on that seat, it's still a very expensive seat. So you need to look at the airline at your best trip cost animal, and we believe that's the E2. And the other element, and I like you— I know you like to talk about new technology and SAF, but of course this again confirms the industry that we're uber reliant on fossil fuels and it's very locally available. So I think the focus on New technology is something that we keep very focused on. We have our innovation verticals, and one vertical is extremely focused on zero-emission technologies. We have EVE, which is a small vertical takeoff machine that will come to the market. We did a lot of test flights with that, so we will keep doing that, and we're even more energized to do that.

Richard Quest:I love this question. If you had to rebuild from scratch— this is for Lufthansa— if you had to rebuild from scratch today, no legacy fleet, No slots, no political constraints. How much of your current business model would you honestly keep?

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Well, hypothetical question. I mean, who really would ask such a question and who would answer it? We are living in a world which day by day gets more affected by geoeconomics, by geopolitics. That's everything that's happening around us. So the question should be the other way around. What do you do now when it gets worse and worse around you, and how do you manage that? So I think we are in the business of risk management. That's what airlines are very good at. We have everyday risks management in multiple ways. That's the way to do it. Risk management, scenario planning, that's what we have to do now. And seeing which of your strategy elements that you have thought hopefully through also before the crisis you can execute now, maybe faster. That's what we have. That's, that's the name of the game and not some hypothetical way of the world is all honeymoon and greenfield approach. That's not the way we should do it.

Richard Quest:But I love what you've just said on this idea of— because I think this is truly the art of what you do in aviation or indeed in any business. When the shit hits the fan, you obviously clean it off. But how much of your previous plan can you keep going at the same time? How much can, how much can you look and say, we're going to keep that, we're going to bash on? Tim was really strong on that this morning.

Jiri Marek:On which side of the fence you are.

Richard Quest:Go on. True. But, but that is the art, is it not?

Jiri Marek:The secret is, do you think we have only one plan?

Richard Quest:No. Well, you do only have one. You have one plan with different variations.

Jiri Marek:I would say we have rather more plans. You have a lot of letters in ABC, so you just pick up the right one.

Richard Quest:But, but, but it's the goal is to how you keep it going.

Jiri Marek:Well, we look at the airline which always restructure and learn from them what to do next if it doesn't work.

Richard Quest:Oh, tell us more. Tell us more. You've just, you've just launched an attack on, on—

Jiri Marek:go on. No, no, it's just simply like, I mean, all airlines are restructuring. He's completely right. It became the commodity. On the revenue, somebody told today, the revenue you can extract from market is more or less given. If you are good in it with technology, you might extract 5% more than somebody else. It's all about the cost control. We have to constantly transform and restructure.

Richard Quest:Then taking that as a given, how much of your plan before February are you still hoping to implement going forward? How much have you changed the plan?

Jiri Marek:We actually improved the plan. We opened additional 3 destinations after it happened.

Richard Quest:Which ones?

Jiri Marek:Brač, which is an island on the Adriatic coast, because we expect people will look for the leisure destination. Then we, thanks to Lufthansa reducing, we announced Munich returning after 18 years because we see there's an opportunity and we move forward the Spain destinations a bit because we expect the demand And yourself, what changes?

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:Not much. We have chosen not to return to Doha and a couple of other points inside the Arabian Gulf just because of the cost of the operation of that. We can deploy our assets somewhere else and make more money. The thing that frustrates us, I mean, you said about the different plans, aviation is set, you know, we fly planes, that's what we do, and all we can do is then decide, I mean, it's a highly movable object, it's exactly what it's supposed to do. So if it's not flying somewhere making us money, we'll fly it somewhere else where it does. So that's why we've launched, you know, places such as Mogadishu, Port Sudan, we're going into Djibouti.

Richard Quest:Good God, they're not exactly easy places to go to.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:No, they're not. Um, having said that, we were asked once by the civil aviation to keep the plane in Port Sudan. It was safer than bringing it into the Middle East when we were at the end, at the end of February. If you look at what Barra had to do, I mean, that they're still putting buses across the border to get access to You know, to air service.

Richard Quest:Do you understand why Kuwait is still closed?

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:Yeah, there's a very, very narrow decision window for the Kuwaiti defense systems to decide if it's friend or foe, and there's a lot of stuff that goes— obviously it can go over the top into, you know, the Mediterranean area, so we don't fly near there. Everyone's got to avoid that entire corridor, and Kuwait has an exceptionally small decision window.

Richard Quest:Oh, I'm glad you told me that, because That sort of explains it. I was— I think we've all sat here wondering why are they still running buses.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:Yeah, no, it's— Kuwait is still closed. You know, you know what's coming in. Even last year, you know, the Iranians were very clear about, you know, during the day you can fly to Tehran, during the day Tehran-Shiraz. We put flights back in there. We can go back in there now. We're still risk-averse. We haven't made that decision. And it's just that even places such as Baghdad, same answer.

Richard Quest:So with these corridors that we hear about, they're obviously based on intelligence, they're based upon security and safety. It's quite an interesting concept for the passenger to think about, you know, that certain corridors have been designated and delineated.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:It is. I mean, we obviously have to explain that clearly, but if you go into, you know, for example, Bahrain has just opened. We don't fly there, but others do. Then you go in via Riyadh and You go in via Riyadh and then turn right and you fly in a straight line from Riyadh down into, into Bahrain and Dammam. So you've got to be very clear so everybody knows who you are and what you're doing, and it's just the flight identification zones.

Richard Quest:And that's how it's been all worked out?

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:It has all been worked out. I mean, there's a lot of cooperation and collaboration between all the different civil aviations and the transportation groups to ensure, and the ministries of defense, that you know where you're going and what's happening.

Richard Quest:Um, on this question of European carriers, I, I don't know if you were at A4E earlier in, in, in the year. I got the distinct whiff that European carriers have got the bit between the teeth. on this question of the Gulf? You know, we can start to make margins again, or we can make great gains against the Gulf because we— it's proven that there is a systemic strategic importance for us to fly certain places that we've not— that we've had to give up.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Well, one thing is important. If Europe has learned that it cannot defend itself alone, if Europe has learned that it cannot supply its own energy resources alone. It should for sure be able to create the mobility that makes it independent when certain situations appear that we don't know. At least that should be workable. How can we ensure in the future from a European perspective that this is something we guarantee, the mobility that is needed for the continent is secured? I think The European carriers have an important role to play in there. And for that, we need also a level playing field of competition, be it airspace. You know, we lost a lot of market share to China because we don't overfly Russian airspace anymore. That's not a level playing field. We had other situations where support and standards were different in different geographies. So that's something that should be part of the geostrategic map of Europe. in the interest of the mobility and in the interest of the transport of the continent. So we believe in that. And I think this topic becomes even more important looking forward in a more unstable world.

Richard Quest:Yeah, except the regulators in Europe will never give you anything.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:We'll see. I mean, that's the discussion that's ongoing.

Jiri Marek:Yeah.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:And that's something we, I think, become more adamant now that we see these events happening more and more around us.

Richard Quest:One final thought, starting with you, sir. The point about this industry is you wake up in the morning and you read the news feed and, oh no, what the fuck has happened now? How did you feel when you woke up? And I mean, and now you're looking at what to do next. Do you just think, oh God, I want to put my head in the sand?

Arjan Meijer:I think we have a room full of aviation people here. I've worked in the industry for quite a few years and this happens quite frequently, right? I mean, just be— just at the moment you think, okay, now we're, now we're in a good place, we have a plan, let's move forward, someone throws a spanner in the wheel. And whether that's Ukraine, whether that's now it's Iran, whether it's whatever crisis. So I think we've all grown used to it and we just, you know, we know how to attack the crisis. We internally, we say we live for the challenge, right? Because that's a positive way of getting over it.

Richard Quest:But, uh, We live for the challenge.

Arjan Meijer:Live for the challenge, that is. And that's what you need to do in aviation, I guess.

Richard Quest:Do you live for the challenge?

Jiri Marek:Definitely.

Richard Quest:So when you wake up in the morning and you see what crap's happened, what do you think?

Jiri Marek:Well, I need to find a way how to relax the stress, because if I will solve it with alcohol, I will become either alcoholic, or if I will solve it with good food—

Richard Quest:I wasn't expecting that as an answer. How do you— what do you do to release the— this is a great question to ask. What do you do to release the stress? Don't— be careful. Actually, I think I need to rephrase that question.

Jiri Marek:I'm born Libra and I'm doing the martial art called Aikido, so I'm trying to balance.

Richard Quest:Really?

Jiri Marek:You do all of that?

Richard Quest:Yes.

Jiri Marek:That's how I release the stress. I'm not using it on colleagues in the office, but—

Richard Quest:We've only got your word for that. What do you do to relieve the stress?

Arjan Meijer:Go for a run. I did this morning here in the Tiergarten Park. Very nice.

Adrian Hamilton-Manns:Sir, we don't get stressed. I mean, we're just so— we're in a region where if it's not happening today, it's going to happen tomorrow. Last, last year, Q2, India-Pakistan went to war. All sorts of things happened and you just get so used to it. You wake up in the morning, you see what happens this time.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:It's like, okay, I stick with inhale stress. Exhale confidence. I think that's very important for management these days.

Richard Quest:Do that again. Give us a demonstration.

Tamur Goudarzi Pour:Give us a demonstration. Exhale confidence. I think that's a very important management topic these days.

Richard Quest:I would pay good money to have you give me a demonstration. Ladies and gentlemen, our panel. Thank you very much indeed.

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