The African aviation market has always been promising and filled with opportunities yet operating in the environment is challenging. It is a fast-growing market in which air connectivity went up by 30 per cent from 2014 to 2019. Africa has a large and young workforce that can drive economic growth, which brings velocity to digital innovations. The continent has skipped certain stages of digitalization and jumped right into the mobile world. Coupled with the entrepreneurial spirit seen across the continent, African travelers have adopted smart, digital solutions such as micro money platforms. There will be room for all types of business models in Africa in the future: Full Service, Hybrid, Low-Cost and Ultra-Low-Cost carriers. When defining their new business model, airlines need to consider how the new normal will shape up, which segments they can serve best and where they see the greatest potential.
African carriers just like every other carrier were badly hit by the devastating COVID-19. This has further added to the excruciating pain of the continent’s airlines. African Airlines were hit hard by the pandemic with capacity dropping to 20 per cent or less of 2019 levels. Most are planning to produce below 80 per cent levels compared to 2019 by the end of 2021. With vaccines being administered in global markets and being identified as one key driver, we are now just entering the phase of recovery. African Airlines are facing the question of how they can use this crisis as an opportunity to transform their business model. In their search for answers, airline managers need to take an investor’s perspective on their own enterprise and evaluate two main dimensions. Africa’s air transports woes are well documented and one that may remain so for many years to come because of so many factors such as low capital to run a very sensitive venture like an airline, provision of airports infrastructure, high lease rental of aircraft and equipment, high airport taxes and charges, navigational system, low traffic made up of virtually empty airspaces, low propensity to travel by air, and lack of disposable income occasioned by poverty and poverty of many African nations among other issues.