The world’s first passenger airline services was started by an ancestor of modern-day British Airways, George Holt Thomas in 1920s in Europe. In the beginning, only available aircraft were produced initially for military purpose. Therefore, it was an arduous task for companies to transport people by air on transformed carriers. Yet, as many years have passed, this market expanded in size, creating a multitude of sub-markets within its structure to perform necessary services.
Evolution of the European passenger aviation market
Except for the years 2009 and 2020,
global passenger air traffic demand has increased steadily since 2006, making it one of the largest markets in Europe. From 2013 onwards, the
passenger capacity of commercial airlines in Europe increased by at least 3.4 percent, despite 2020, when European airlines were hit very hard by the
coronavirus outbreak worldwide, losing 70 percent of their
passenger traffic and reporting
net losses. However, in the following year, the aviation industry in Europe showed signs of recovery from the negative effects of the coronavirus pandemic. The European market's net loss has plummeted to 12 billion dollars in 2021, down from 34.5 million dollars in 2020, and the market has registered net gains for the subsequent years. Particularly, the net profit of commercial airlines in Europe reached 7.7 billion U.S. dollars in 2023.
How did European airlines handled the pandemic?
To survive the pandemic, European airlines had to either
adjust their schedule by adding new routes to countries where restrictions were partially or fully lifted or increase their
cargo capacity. Amidst the global pandemic, Lufthansa Group was the
leading airline in Europe based on revenue, and just under 4.6 million euros was generated by its
logistic operations in 2022. It is worth mentioning that Lufthansa Group owns SWISS, Austrian Airways, and Eurowings as its subsidiaries. Moreover, Lufthansa group
uplifted the largest number of travelers that year compared to the other European airlines, amounting to 101.8 million passengers.
Outlook of the aviation industry
Despite temporary economic shocks such as the global financial crisis of 2008 or the coronavirus outbreak in 2020, the future of passenger aviation is obvious. As long as the desire of individuals to travel or market expansions of businesses will grow, the passenger aviation market is going to expand in response. From 2019 to 2041, it is forecasted that the estimated
annual growth rates for passenger air traffic will be positive globally and three percent in Europe. Although passenger aviation in the Asia Pacific region was insignificant in size a couple of decades ago, by 2050, it is forecasted to become the
largest market globally, with 5.85 billion passengers, surpassing the European and North American flow of travelers.
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