CAPA Asia Aviation Summit 2019
Thursday 14 November 2019
8:00
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Registration, Networking & Coffee
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9:00
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Chairman’s Welcome
CAPA – Centre for Aviation, Chairman Emeritus, Peter Harbison
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9:10
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Asia Aviation Outlook Keynote
CAPA – Centre for Aviation, Chairman Emeritus, Peter Harbison [Download Presentation]
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9:30
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Airline Keynote: Resilient Skyline
Thai AirAsia, Executive Chairman, Tassapon Bijleveld [Download Presentation]
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9:50
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Outlook: The keys to airline survival and success in an economic downturn
Over recent years we’ve been through a period of relatively benign external inputs, with low fuel prices supporting lower fares and a solid global economy supporting demand. This has propelled the industry into a period of unprecedented profitability (although US airlines, mostly operating domestically, have accounted for around half of this). The period of high profitability is unlikely to continue as oil prices, currently in the mid-USD60s/barrel for Brent Crude, creep up and as business and consumer confidence – at least, outside the US – slips rapidly. The IMF recently issued a warning that the global economy is weakening “faster than expected” and downgraded GDP growth forecasts for 2019, and the European Central Bank has “substantially” revised downwards its economic growth projections for 2019, implying a slackening of demand in markets which have become increasingly price sensitive. At the same time, the entire aviation system is undergoing a technology-led upheaval of volcanic proportions, challenging conventional norms and demanding new solutions to new problems (and opportunities). Airline management’s role is to prepare for and manage the airline prudently through good times and bad; in a downturn this means minimising the impact on profitability while remaining competitive.
Moderator: CAPA - Centre for Aviation, Chairman Emeritus, Peter Harbison
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10:35 | Coffee Break & Networking |
11:05 | Airline Keynote: How Garuda Indonesia Survived in Turbulent Industry Garuda Indonesia, President & CEO, I. Gusti Ngurah Askhara Danadiputra |
11:25 | Emerging Aviation Powerhouses: China, India, Indonesia and Vietnam Asia has enjoyed spectacular growth over the past several years. While China has clearly led the way, South Korea and Taiwan have also grown rapidly, and even Japan has had a resurgence in the past few years. After several years of double-digit traffic growth, supported by accelerating international expansion plans by its home carriers, India is expected to emerge as the world’s third largest aviation market within the next five years.
Moderator: National University of Singapore, Professor of Law, Alan Tan
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12:10 | Distribution and digital transformation: Where we are up to with NDC? Travelport, Global Head of New Distribution, Ian Heywood |
12:25 | Challenges to traditional distribution and selling in Asia’s fast changing market Legacy distribution systems have for decades presented airlines with the twin problems of high costs and product commoditisation. In efforts to address these issues, a handful of carriers throughout the world have invested heavily into establishing their own API channels with agents, while the concurrent push by IATA for airlines to implement the NDC standard has encouraged the industry to adopt a retail focused approach to distribution. The GDS will also need to evolve in order to remain relevant and to compete effectively against other intermediaries and aggregators such as metasearch companies (some of which now have direct booking capabilities), as well as digital behemoths such as Amazon, Google, and Facebook - to gain a slice of the pie. But as airlines work on enhancing their retail offering and improving their merchandising capability via both direct and indirect channels, a resounding message from industry players is that airlines need to consider the importance of mobile and messaging platforms, which are slowly replacing the desktop as the preferred interface for researching and booking travel.
Moderator: Travelport, Global Head of New Distribution, Ian Heywood
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13:05 | Lunch & Networking | ||||||||||||||
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15:20 | Coffee Break & Networking |
16:00 | Frequent Flyer and Loyalty Programmes - Driving traveller value and airline revenue Frequent flyer programmes have been a common part of many airlines’ loyalty strategies over several decades now. But they have evolved from elemental loyalty models with modest money-making strategies into major revenue earners. With growing industry maturity and drastically improved technology and data analytics capabilities, the nature of FFPs is being transformed. The contrast between these programmes and the activity of flying is dramatic. One has limited capital investment needs and generates cash almost merely by existing; the other, ringed by safety and economic regulation is highly capital intensive and even more risky, in exceptional circumstances returns a modest profit. There are however few exponents who have climbed the heights of optimising the FFP business – for it is a business now, with a sideline of loyalty. Qantas is a leader in the field. It is for example targeting EBIT of AUD500 million from its FFP by 2021. To put that in context, in FY2019 Qantas returned a total profit of just over AUD1 billion. And Air Canada, arguably the first airline to create a genuine financial model for FFPs early this century, having sold off its programme, has recently re-acquired it. With the advent of sophisticated data analytics, FFPs have also become much more than an internalised activity, with the ability now to drive change right across the business, from revenue management to network planning and beyond. In short, FFPs have become a valuable commodity in more ways than one. But, mingled with their poor cousins, the flying part of the airline, market valuations are often suppressed.
Moderator: On Point Loyalty, Managing Partner, Evert de Boer
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16:40 | How Data Analytics is reshaping the industry For decades airlines carelessly discarded information about their customers, leaving this powerful tool in the hands of intermediaries and the GDSs. As airlines sought to wrest back market power and to reshape their focus from flying towards distribution and other revenue forms, this coincided with vastly increased computing power and an ability to assimilate vast amounts of data into something meaningful. This is transforming the way airlines think and work, from operational analytics to leveraging data to generate better commercial returns. But it is still early days and the potential of this art has many forms still to display. And of course it’s not just airlines who are playing in this park. Few organisations have more consumer data than Facebook, Amazon, Google – and the numbers of potential players is growing by the day. Inevitably some airlines are more advanced than others, so the gap between big and small tends to grow.
Moderator: APEX, CEO, Dr. Joe Leader
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17:20 | Q&A with VietJet Moderator: CAPA - Centre for Aviation, Chairman Emeritus, Peter Harbison VietJet, President & CEO, Thao Nguyen Thi Phuong Closing Remarks CAPA - Centre for Aviation, Chairman Emeritus, Peter Harbison |
17:35 | Closing Remarks CAPA - Centre for Aviation, Chairman Emeritus, Peter Harbison |
17:40 | Welcome to Networking Drinks Malaysia Airports, General Manager, Airline Marketing Division, Sallauddin Mat Sah |
17:45 | Day 1 Close |
18:45 | Pre-Dinner Drinks Hosted by Malaysia Airports |
19:30-22:00 | CAPA Asia Pacific Aviation Awards for Excellence Hosted by Travelport |