Corporate Travel Analysis Reports For Europe/MEA

London Heathrow was one of the busiest airports in the world before the pandemic, but remains outside the top 50 in terms of weekly seats. It had been one of the world's most constrained airports for years with its two runways officially at full capacity, but for around a year it has actually been operating using just one of them as the COVID-19 pandemic and the heavy travel restrictions has reduced demand.

Many believe that the solution to crowded roads in urban centres is to take to the air. Urban air mobility is certainly the popular thinkers answer and there are a plethora of concepts for small and sustainable aircraft to provide mass transportation for intra-city, short-haul and even regional travel.

SWISS is aiming to provide a little extra comfort and offer a few further travel benefits to its regular travellers with the introduction of a new premium economy offering onboard the Boeing 777-300ER aircraft that serve its long-haul routes. The European flag carrier will debut the new cabin offering in the fourth quarter of this year and has opened bookings for premium economy travel across the entire Boeing 777-300ER route network from Apr-2022.

It is not often that it takes 18 months for an airline to reveal to the world the latest interior innovations that come with the arrival of a new aircraft type into its fleet. In the case of Qatar Airways and the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner that is exactly the unusual case as the Gulf carrier introduced the variant into scheduled operations on the Doha-Milan route on 25-Jun-2021.

The lockdown of billions of people globally put into stark relief the price of stopping business travel. "Only when travel was taken away did its value to worldwide trade become clear, both in terms of disruptions and missed opportunities," says the introduction to 'The Future of Business Travel', a new report from business aviation specialist VistaJet and WSJ Intelligence.

New research from travel technology specialist Amadeus has indicated that both business and leisure travellers see digital health passports as a vital tool in opening up travel. However, their views on use of data, brands and technology adoption are varied and that will remain a challenge to tailor the passenger experience and install confidence back into travel.

Over the first six months of 2021 airline CEOs from across the world have spoken openly at the monthly CAPA Live virtual summit about air travel, the coronavirus crisis and the path to recovery. To say 2020 and 2021 have been a challenge for these professionals is a major understatement and each shares the journey for their respective airlines through one of the biggest crises to hit the world.

Airlines and hotels are starting to see lifts in bookings and traveller sentiment is strengthening in many parts of the world as vaccination programmes continue. As projected, the leisure and VFR markets are showing the strongest recovery, short-haul is ahead of long-haul and LCCs ahead of legacy models due to this current traveller demographic.

Back in Aug-2019, European airports welcomed more than 262 million passengers, according to data from ACI Europe, the European industry trade association which advances the collective interests of Europe's airports and promotes professional excellence in airport management and operations.

Urban Air Mobility (UAM) is a new air transportation system for passengers and cargo in and around urban environments that is being enabled by developments such as the enhancement of battery technologies and electric propulsion for vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL).