LEARNING UNIT 4:

Cooperation and alliances in the airline industry

The purpose of unit 4 is to enable you to understand the holistic development of the cooperation
and alliances within the global air industry.

Unit Outcomes
On completion of this unit, you should be able to

• explain the evolution and development of alliances within the global airline industry
• understand the motives and benefits of airline alliances
• demonstrate your understanding of the operations of the African airlines

4.1. INTRODUCTION

In today’s highly competitive business environment, to achieve competitive advantage or to

survive, many companies have formed strategic linkages with others (Baxter & Srisaeng 2017: 1).
As the world changes, forces such as globalisation and increased competition across all global
industries start to affect these industries and changes start to occur. For these reasons, the airline
industry has seen a definite shift from “firm-versus-firm to group-versus-group” (Amankwah-
Amoah & Debrah 2011) as alliances and constellations dominate the global airspace. In this
learning unit we will consider the global airline industry and explore the alliances that exist, how
they came into being, their impact on the industry and the economics involved in all of this.

This learning unit takes on a slightly different format to previous learning units. It is structured
around a prescribed article by Amankwah, Amoah and Debrah (2011) that encompasses all the
key factors of this topic. As you work your way through this learning unit, you will be instructed to
read individual sections of the article and then return to the learning unit for additional information
and instructions. Please note that you will be assessed on the content of the article.

The prescribed article is:

4.2. Getting started

This learning unit is divided into four parts, each of which is based on a certain section of the
article. These parts will highlight the key ideas from each section of the article, discuss any
relevant economic principles and end off with some self-assessment questions and discussion
forums.

It is extremely important that you read the relevant section of the article FIRST, think about the
content and THEN return to the learning unit for additional discussion. The learning unit alone is
insufficient.

4.3. Part 1: Introduction and the resource-based view of global strategic alliances

Read pages 37 to 40 of the prescribed article, under subheadings: Introduction, and The
resource-based view of global strategic alliances.

As with all academic essays and papers, this article begins with an introduction that includes the
topics that will be discussed within the text. It is a great example of a concise introduction. Let’s
have a brief look at the main topics mentioned, as they will be discussed in detail within the text.

Collaboration: Alliances are formed when individual firms decide to collaborate with each other.
Collaboration is the word used to describe cooperation between two or more firms. These firms
begin to work together to achieve certain goals, instead of working independently. Collaboration
is the essence of an airline alliance.

Mechanisms of collaboration: What does this “working together” mean from a practical
perspective? It means that firms share and combine their resources (Amankwah-Amoah &
Debrah 2011). These resources include financial and human capital resources such as technical
and managerial expertise. Firms that are strong in some areas can share their resources with
alliance partners and, in turn, they can obtain resources in areas where they are lacking. Firms
are also able to share risks. Firms have stronger bargaining power when it comes to dealing with
airline regulatory bodies – alliances allow them to avoid certain barriers to entry and ownership
restrictions. Overall, the aim is to increase revenues and reduce costs by collaborating with other
firms.

NOTE: Economies of scale

As students of Transport Economics, it is important to know the correct economic terminology of

certain principles. The paragraph above can be summarised as Economies of scale. Economic
of scale here refers to the situation when sharing resources reduces the total cost whilst
increasing the number of flights. The total cost per flight is less when airlines work together than
when they work alone (Investopedia.com 2016). To remind yourself about the economies of scale,

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and structure of the competition in the transport sector, you can revisit the Transport Economics
module, TRL2602.

Which alliances dominate the industry?

There are three principle alliances in the international airline industry:

• Star Alliance: 28 members, in 1 300 airports across 192 countries (Chan, Chu, Wu & Wen
2021:2).
• SkyTeam: 20 members, 1 057 destinations in 179 countries (Chan, Chu, Wu & Wen 2021:2).
• oneworld: 16 members, 1,011 destinations in 154 countries (Chan, Chu, Wu & Wen 2021:2).

The table below confirms that these three are the largest alliances, highlights these alliances’
market regions looking at their market layouts, market shares, and the highest number of member
airlines, destinations, routes, and flights among these airline alliances' market shares.

Attributes Oneworld Star Alliance SkyTeam

Number of airlines 14 27 20
Number of flag carriers 10 21 15
Number of destinations 935 1199 1048
Number of routes 4862 8813 6763
Number of flights 1,172,780 1,988,715 1,815,943
Market share * 16% 22% 19%

4.4. Part 2: The evolution of alliances in the global airline industry

Read pages 40 to 42 of the prescribed article, under subheading: The evolution of alliances
in the global airline industry.

This section explains the history of alliances in the airline industry and gives a number of specific
examples. From this we learn that the Chicago Convention of 1944 (a pivotal event in the airline
industry, as discussed in learning unit 1) encouraged collaboration between airlines and
established the tradition of cooperation in the industry (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011).
Although rare in the 1980s, alliances became common in the late 1990s and have since become
an essential part of the industry (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011).

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Airlines within an alliance share activities such as sourcing, production and branding of aircraft.
They also partake in strategic alliance activities such as code sharing, block booking, joint
marketing and the sharing of frequent flyer codes (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). We
discuss all of these activities in detail in Part 3.

The crux of this section of the article is that, in order to gain a competitive advantage, airlines
need to collaborate and share activities. For instance, if they wish to have a vast route network
across many countries, it would be close to impossible to make sure that they have adequate
outlets and sufficient staff for each airport (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). By joining an
alliance, member airlines can split certain of these activities among them. For example, instead
of having staff in 80 airports, an airline can have staff in 40 but still operate and generate revenue
from 80. These benefits are discussed from an economic perspective in Part 3, below.

4.5. Part 3: The motives and benefits of airline alliances constellation

Read pages 42 to 43 of the prescribed article under the subheading: The motives and
benefits of airline alliances constellation.

This section really gets into the economics of airline alliances and why these alliances are so
prevalent in the industry. We discuss alliance structures under three headings: Improved
efficiencies, Cost reductions, and Market structures.

4.5.1. Alliances to improve operational efficiencies

The article discusses the improvement to functional efficiencies that alliances allow. Let’s look at
these in bit more detail, as well as at the economic impacts of each.

4.5.1.1 Airport facilities

Alliances allow individual member firms to benefit from the sharing of airport facilities such as
lounges, check-in counters and terminals (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). By pooling these
resources and sharing them, member airlines can improve the efficiency of their operations and
ultimately provide a better service to their customers.

The ability to provide passengers with airline lounges is a differentiating characteristic that is
considered an improvement to customer service and can be used as a customer retention tool.
Shared check-in counters and terminals allow airlines to take advantage of economies of scale
(Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). Fewer counters and terminals are able to service more

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airlines, reducing the human capital required to run the operations, as well as reducing the
overhead costs of the airports such as electricity, cleaning services, general equipment and so
on. All of these consequences increase the overall efficiency of the airlines as a group and reduce
the costs per airline.

4.5.1.2 Access to information, markets, resources and technologies

Along with physical facilities, airlines that are members of alliances have access to “soft” skills
such as information and knowledge (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). Larger and more
mature airlines have certain knowledge and skills – acquired through experience – that smaller
and younger airlines do not have. These more mature airlines have often gone through many
more economic and business cycles and have the expertise on how to best handle these
situations. Smaller airlines can benefit from this knowledge when in alliances with more mature
firms. In addition, members of airline alliances have access to larger and more extensive route
networks across larger geographical areas (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). For example,
when SAA joined Star Alliance, the members of Star Alliance were exposed to the previously
unattainable routes in Africa in which SAA operates. And, in return, SAA was able to access new
international routes through other members. Increased network sizes increase the scope of the
airlines and benefit their service offering.

A significant advantage of being a member of an alliance is the access to advanced technologies

that allow for joint marketing arrangements (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). For example,
alliances usually have centralised networks to which all member networks are connected. These
often consist of computerised booking systems which allow the block booking of seats on each
other’s airlines, exposing their customers to routes that were previously unavailable to them
(Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). Block booking generally happens through code-sharing.
Code sharing is when two or more airlines advertise the same flight under their own names, but
the flight is operated by only one of them (Aeroflot 2016). In South Africa this happens only
between airlines of the same group. For example, Comair trades as Kulula.com and also operates
British Airways flights as a local franchise. Sometimes a passenger books a flight on the Kulula
website, but when they get to the airport the flight is actually on a British Airways plane. This is
because the two airlines share the route. This often happens on a quieter route – there is no
sense in flying a Kulula plane and British Airways plane to Port Elizabeth when they are both only
half full. Kulula therefore “block books” seats on the British Airways flight and sells tickets for that
flight. A full aircraft travels to Port Elizabeth and both airlines benefit.

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Alliance members can also create price packages that provide customers with discounts and
deals when booking within an alliance. Reduced prices help to increase demand and generate
extra traffic. Alliance members can utilise the economies of scale that exist due to the large
number of flights available within the alliance group. Overall, access to improved technologies
and joint marketing schemes improves the efficiency of all the airlines within the alliance,
increasing demand (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011).

4.5.2. Alliances to reduce overall costs to airlines

As important as it is for alliances to improve efficiencies, it is equally important to reduce costs.

Alliances capitalise on their economies of scale when it comes to equipment procurement and
servicing and staff training. This was a must during the Covid-19 pandemic, where flying and/or
operating solo would be suicidal.

Consider the following example: According to the Airbus Global Market Forecast 2011–2030
(2011), 1 390 deliveries of new passenger and freight aircraft are expected per annum between
2011 and 2030. If we assume that there are 869 international airlines (excluding subsidiaries)
(Airbus 2011), that equates to 1.6 aircraft purchases per airline, per annum. Seeing as one cannot
purchase 0.6 of an aircraft, let’s round down to 1 aircraft per airline per annum on average. If an
airline is part of an alliance, the alliance as a whole will purchase aircraft more regularly. Take
Star Alliance for instance. Star Alliance has 28 member airlines. If each airline is purchasing one
new aircraft every year, that makes up a total of 28 new aircraft per annum. Alliances are able to
broker deals with aircraft manufacturers using this data. For example, they can guarantee that
they will purchase at least 20 aircraft per annum. This is very appealing to the manufacturers who
would no doubt be happy to offer substantial discounts or beneficial payment terms given the
certainty of the sales. Airlines can therefore greatly reduce their costs of purchasing new aircraft
when this is done through an alliance (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). The same applies to
joint engineering services and parts procurement (Amankwah-Amoah & Debrah 2011). The
advantage of economies of scale when it comes to purchasing and maintaining equipment is
paramount to the appeal and success of airline alliances.

In Africa, some of the most famous names in African aviation are struggling. One of Africa’s
biggest airlines, South African Airways (SAA), has not made a profit since 2011 in a period marred

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by mismanagement. Draft financial results for 2018 and 2019 made public by SAA in May reveal
losses of R10.6bn ($661m) over the two-year period.

But as African Airlines Association (AFRAA) was holding its annual assembly, it was announced
that SAA and Ethiopian Airlines (Africa’s biggest airline) were in discussions about Ethiopian
Airlines providing planes, pilots and management to SAA. The effort - which could lead to wider
consolidation - could offer an example of how African airlines can work together during the
pandemic. AFRAA secretary general Abdérahmane Berthé says that consolidation and
collaboration – enabled by further liberalisation of the sector – will be the key drivers of an African
airline renaissance.

Even prior to Covid-19, intra-Africa connectivity was a challenge. To resolve this issue,
governments need to support the integration of Africa and ensure policies that allow a conducive
environment for the development and provision of safe, reliable and affordable air transport in
Africa, necessary for the free movement of persons, goods and services in the continent. The
recovery of the airline industry post Covid-19 will be better realised through airline collaboration
and liberalisation of African skies. "A key element of the liberalisation ought to be the introduction
of the long-awaited African Union Single African Air Transport Market Initiative (SAATM –
commonly referred to as the “Open Skies” Treaty), he says (Spillane 2021). “SAATM will go a long
way to facilitate the airlines’ rebound due to the fact that market access is a critical challenge for
airlines. It will have a positive impact on air transport in Africa: better connectivity, reduced journey
times, reduced ticket fares and a contribution to the sustainability of airline operations.”

As we discussed in section 4.5.1.2 above, alliances often combine their technological and
computer networks. This means that similar operating systems and programmes are used. This
creates an obvious synergy in staff training because all staff across the globe can be trained on
the same programmes and systems. Training programmes can therefore be merged, again taking
advantage of economies of scale, and reducing training workshop and general training costs.

ACTIVITY 4.1

Go to Discussion Forum 4.1 and share with your fellow students your ideas on why the sharing
of an airport check-in benefits the members of an alliance.

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ACTIVITY 4.2

Read the case study below and then go to myUnisa Discussion Forum 4.2 and participate in a
discussion on this case study.

Case Study 1: Star Alliance

Star Alliance is the largest of the three dominant global airline alliances (Tugores-Garcia 2012:1).
It was launched in May 1997 by United Airlines, Air Canada, Lufthansa, SAS and Thai Airways
International (Tugores-Garcia 2012:62). SAA joined the alliance in 2006 as the 18th member.
SAA was the first African member to join the alliance and helped to make it a truly global alliance.

Star Alliance currently has 28 member airlines across 192 countries (Star Alliance 2016). It serves
1 330 airports across the world, with 18 500 departures per day, transporting 641 million
passengers per annum (Star Alliance 2015). Star Alliance employs over 430 000 people and
members have access to over 10 000 airport lounges (Star Alliance 2015).

Star Alliance formally launched its Connecting Partner Model (CPM) in December 2015 (CAPA
2015). The CPM is an innovation that allows alliances to work with low-cost carriers. This is a
major development in the industry, as traditionally low-cost carriers compete against alliances.
The main method of cooperation that Star Alliance will offer low-cost carriers, within the CPM, is
on connecting flights (CAPA 2015). For example, Mango Airlines (which is Star Alliance’s first
planned partner) will be able to receive bookings when passengers connect from a Star Alliance
member airline flight to a Mango flight. This means that Mango will benefit from an increased
number of feeder flights. Mango plans to have joined the CPM by the third quarter of 2016 and,
therefore, the results remain to be seen (CAPA 2015).

4.5.3. Perfect competition, monopolies and oligopolies

We touched on the concept of monopolies and oligopolies in learning unit 1. These market
structures are often part of airline industries and are important to consider when dealing with
airline alliances. Below, we discuss the three main market structures that exist in the airline
industry so that you can get a sense of how alliances affect market structures.

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As a basis for comparison, let’s have a look at basic industry demand and supply curves. Graph
1 below shows the downward sloping demand curve, with price shown along the Y axis and with
quantity demanded shown along the X axis. Consider a flight between Durban and Johannesburg.
At a price of R1 for an air ticket, demand will be at its maximum point. At a price of R15 000 (for
example) for the same flight, demand will be at zero. It is clear that as price decreases demand
increases – demand and price are inversely proportional.

The supply curve, which is upward sloping, explains that at a price of R1, no airline will be willing
to supply a flight between Durban and Johannesburg and, as a result, supply will equal zero. At
a price of R15 000 for the same flight, airlines will be willing to supply as much as possible and
supply will be at a maximum quantity, i.e. as price increases, so supply increases – supply is
proportionate to price.

Ultimately a market equilibrium price is set where supply equals demand.

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 FIGURE 1: Demand and supply (Thismatter.com 2016)

With that as a base, let’s consider the demand curves of firms within each market structure. Note
that the curves in figure 2 below are for individual firms within the market, and not for the market
itself.

FIGURE 2: The market continuum

Perfect competition – Oligopoly – Monopoly

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 GRAPH 2: Demand curve in a perfectly competitive market

4.5.3.1 Perfect competition

Perfect competition is an extreme market structure that rarely exists in real life, but it gives context
to other market structures. As you can see above in figure 2, it is on the one extreme of the market
continuum. A perfectly competitive market has the following attributes:

• Homogenous (identical) product offering

• Large number of buyers and sellers
• Firms can enter and exit the market easily
• Perfect information exists, i.e. firms and consumers have access to the same information
(Vasigh 2013)

As a result of these characteristics, firms have no control over price and this is determined by
customer demand (Vasigh 2013). Figure 3 below shows the demand curve in this market – no
matter what the quantity demanded, the price remains the same (Vasigh 2013). Firms are price-
takers – if they increase their prices above the market price, demand for the firm’s services will
be zero; if the firm reduces its prices below the market price, the firm will make a loss. In a perfect
market a firm will not trade at a loss. The closest industry example of perfect competition is the
agricultural industry, as the product is identical in many instances (Vasigh 2013).

Figure 3:

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 Demand curve in a perfectly competitive
market

4.5.3.2 Monopoly

The other extreme case of a market structure is a monopoly (Vasigh 2013). A monopoly exists
when there is only one seller of a good or service in a market (Vasigh 2013). This market structure
generally exists within a certain geographical area or market – for example, SAA was the only
airline to offer a direct flight between South Africa and The United States until 2006 (at which time
Delta Airlines launched its non-stop flight between Johannesburg and Atlanta) (Mail & Guardian
2007). No other airlines offered this flight and, as such, SAA was able to set the price. SAA may
not have had a monopoly of the entire international airline industry in South Africa, but it had a
monopoly over that route. A monopoly has the following characteristics:

• No substitute goods exist.

• Lack of information – consumers have no access to information; therefore firms can charge
any price that they wish to.
• High barriers to entry, e.g. technical, legal, government, labour, etc (Vasigh 2013).

Figure 4 below illustrates the demand curve of a firm in a monopoly market. This demand curve
is exactly the same as the market demand curve, because the firm is the market – no other firms

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exist. Let’s use the SAA monopoly on the SA-USA route as an example. As the only provider of
flights to the USA directly from South Africa, the demand curve for SAA is the market demand
curve.

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 Figure 4:
Demand curve in a monopoly

ACTIVITY 4.3

You have now been introduced to the different market structures employed within the airline
industries. Go to Discussion Forum 4.3 to discuss with your fellow students why perfect
competition and monopolies rarely exist in their true form in real life.

4.5.3.3 Oligopoly

An oligopoly exists when a small number of firms dominate a market (Vasigh 2013). This market
structure is prevalent in the airline industry and is the most important market structure in aviation
(Vasigh 2013). You might be thinking that this seems strange due to the large number of airlines
that operate in the market, but oligopoly comes into play when we examine specific routes and
alliances.

The characteristics of an oligopolistic market include:

• There is dominance by a small number of firms.

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• The actions of one firm severely affect the other firms in the market because of the fierce
competition that exists between them.
• A complex interdependence exists between firms (Vasigh 2013).

Let’s look at these characteristics in a real-life market. The domestic airline market in South Africa
is dominated by six airlines: SAA, SA Express, SA Airlink, Kulula, Mango and FlySafair. Let’s
assume that Kulula is considering reducing its fares for travel at the end of May 2022 If they do
so, it is highly likely that the other carriers will do the same and match their fares so that they don’t
lose customers. If this happens, Kulula may consider a further drop in fares to maintain a
competitive advantage, and the other players may match this again. As you can see, this price
war can continue on and on as a result of a complex interdependence between the firms.
Sometimes airlines avoid such price wars by keeping prices high, disadvantaging consumers
(Vasigh 2013). But most often they price aggressively and the average firm ends up operating
below profitability levels (Vasigh 2013).

Alliances contribute to the oligopolistic nature of the airline industry. By collaborating, they form
groups of independent airlines and reduce the number of individual firms. This reduces
competition on major route networks, which these alliances share. The Airbus Market Forecast
(2015) predicted that 70% of growth in airline traffic will be from existing route networks between
2015 and 2034. This means that airlines and alliances are simply increasing traffic along the
routes that they dominate, meaning less space for airlines that are not members of the major
alliances. The alliances are using the economies of scale to dominate routes and, although this
is beneficial in many ways, it also reduces competition along these routes and in the long run
could lead to increased prices for consumers (Vasigh 2013).

Figure 5 shows the demand curve of a firm operating in an oligopoly. The curve is flatter than that
of the monopoly demand curve. Why? Because firm demand is more price elastic in an oligopoly
than in a monopoly. In an oligopoly the consumers have a choice – price increases cause
consumers to buy from a substitute airline and demand for this firm’s flights drop substantially.
Similarly, a price decrease results in a greater increase in demand for the firm, as consumers are
drawn away from other competing firms.

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 Figure 5:
Demand curve in an oligopoly

ACTIVITY 4.4

In an oligopoly, firms react differently to competitors than in other market structures. Discuss how
their interdependence affects this in the context of price wars - have this discussion on
Discussion Forum 4.4 with your fellow students.

4.6 WHY ARE AFRICAN AIRLINES OPERATING ON THE MARGINS OF THE GAAPs?

Read pages 43–47 of the prescribed article under the subheadings: Why are African
airlines operating on the margins of the GAAPs, Internal organisational factors and
External factors.

This section of the article provides a number of case studies on African airlines such as Ghana
Airways and Nigerian Airways that have failed to join alliances. The key determinants of this
situation are as follows:

1. State ownership: A large number of African airlines are state owned. This discourages
alliances from including these airlines for a number of reasons, including:

• Managerial activities of these airlines are heavily restricted by government objectives.

• Inability to make independent and rapid decisions.

(Note: Most alliance member airlines are privatised, i.e., they are owned by private
entities, not governments.)

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2. Firm’s size

• Smaller firms have limited organisational resources that focus on domestic destinations.
This is unappealing to alliances who seek out firms that can add to their resource pool
and not diminish it.

3. Access to scarce resources

• Many African airlines do not have access to scarce resources such as new routes or
efficient cost structures. As a result, they are less attractive to alliances.

4. Geographical coverage

• Unfortunately, most alliances focus on the core of Europe, North America and Asia as
locations for their activities. Africa does not offer as much business opportunity and
alliances therefore require only a small number of African airlines as members. This
reduces the chances of other African airlines being considered.

ACTIVITY 4.5

Go to Discussion Forum 4.5 and share your thoughts on SAA being a state-owned airline and
yet being a member of Star Alliance. Why do you think this is possible? Discuss also how politics
and government objectives reduce an airline’s chance of joining an alliance.

4.7 Conclusion

Read pages 47–48 of the prescribed article under the subheading: Conclusions and
implications.

The airline industry is an extremely competitive environment in which any increases in efficiency
or decreases in costs can mean a significant competitive advantage for an individual firm. Airline
alliances help firms to remain competitive through economies of scale. As a group of firms
cooperating and working together, airline alliances are able to improve their operation efficiencies,
reduce their costs per flight and take advantage of expanding routes networks and airport
facilities. The dominance of airline alliances has created an oligopolistic market structure, in which
smaller firms outside of the tripod area (Europe, North America and Asia) are less likely to become
members, making their attempts at any competitive advantage much more challenging.

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4.8 Bibliography

4.8.1 Recommended Reading

Amankwah-amoah, J., Debrah, Y.A. (2011) The Evolution of Alliances in the Global Airline
Industry: A review of the African experience. Thunderbird International Business Review. Vol 53
(1) pp. 37–50 [Online] Available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/ 10.1002/tie.20388/epdf [22
March 2021].

4.8.2 References

Aeroflot (2016) Code-share flights. [Online] Available at:

http://www.aeroflot.com/cms/en/about/flight [28 March 2021].

Airbus (2011) Global Market Forecast 2011-2030. [Online] Available at:

file:///Users/donnalynch/Documents/UNISA%20Curriculum%20Development/
TRL3703/LU4%20Cooperation%20and%20alliances%20in%20the%20airline%20industry/
2011-2030_Airbus_full_book_delivering_the_future.pdf [28 March 2021].

Airbus (2015) Global Market Forecast 2015-2034. [Online] Available at:

http://www.airbus.com/company/market/forecast/?eID=maglisting_push&tx_
maglisting_pi1%5BdocID%5D=86756 [23 March 2021].

Amankwah-Amoah, J., Debrah, Y.A. (2011) The Evolution of Alliances in the Global Airline
Industry: A review of the African experience. Thunderbird International Business Review.
Vol 53 (1) pp. 37–50 [Online] Available at: http://onlinelibrary.
wiley.com/doi/10.1002/tie.20388/epdf [22 March 2021].

Baxter, G., & Srisaeng, P. (2017). Cooperating to compete in the Global Air Cargo Industry: The
case of the DHL Express and Lufthansa Cargo A.G Joint Venture Airline ‘AeroLogic’.
Journal of Infrastructures. 3 (7).

CAPA, Centre for Aviation (2015) Star Alliance the first global alliance with an LCC platform:
SAA’s Mango becomes first partner. 17 December. [Online] Available at:
http://centreforaviation.com/analysis/star-alliance-the-first-global-alliance-with-an-lcc-
platform-saas-mango-becomes-the-first-partner-258088 [10 April 2021].

Chan, C.-H.; Chu, T.-H.; Wu, J.-H.P.;Wen, T.-H. 2021. Spatially Characterizing Major Airline
Alliances: A Network Analysis. ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information. 10, 37.
https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi10010037

Investopedia. Economies of Scale. [Online] Available at:

http://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/economiesofscale.asp [28 March 2021].

Mail & Guardian (2007) SAA faces new competitors. 10 October 2007. [Online] Available at:
http://mg.co.za/article/2007-10-10-saa-faces-new-competitors [25 March 2021].

Oneworld (2016) Oneworld at a glance. [Online]Available at:

https://www.oneworld.com/news-information/oneworld-fact-sheets/oneworld-at-a-glance/
[28 March 2021].

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Spillane, J. J. (2021). The Role of Air Tanzania in Air Transport in East Africa. Sanata Dharma
University Press.

Skyteam (2016) About Us. [Online] Available at: http://www.skyteam.com/en/about/

[28 March 2021].

South Africa. Department of Transport (2015) White Paper on National Civil Aviation Policy.
[Online] Available at:
http://www.transport.gov.za/Portals/0/Aviation/NewFolder/NCAP%20draft%20final%203%
20Sept_2015.pdf [19 March 2021].

Star Alliance (2016). Destinations. [Online] Available at:

http://www.staralliance.com/en/destinations [28 March 2021].

Star Alliance (2015) The Star Alliance Network. [Online] Available at:
http://www.staralliance.com/documents/20184/680657/Facts+and+Figures/c8797e1f-
12d0-46ea-b5ad-28edfa31803c [10 April 2021].

Tugores-Garcia, A. (2012) Analysis of Global Airline Alliances as a Strategy for International

Network Development. Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. [Online]
Available at:
https://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/75853/821869736-MIT.pdf?sequence=2
[10 April 2021].

Thismatter.com (2016) Supply. [Online] Available at:

http://thismatter.com/economics/supply.htm [28 March 2021].

Vasigh, B, Dr. (2013) Introduction to Air Transport Economics: From Theory to Applications, 2nd
edition. [Online] Available at: https://bookshelf.vitalsource.com/#books/9781472400246/

Williams, S. 2020. African Business. Airlines brainstorm pandemic solutions. [Online]. Available
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