Introduction

The outstanding rise of three major Full Service Carriers of the Gulf area, namely, Emirates, Qatar and Etihad; has reshaped entire market of global aviation, especially around Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and Doha. These airlines are adopting diversified means of business strategies in order to meet the increasing global competitiveness. with initiations of these FSCs the Gulf airlines are developing as “global super-connectors” that has the capability of connecting any of the two determined global points, with single stopover in the Gulf (Editorial, 2013, see Figure. 1).

The derivations of Ulrichsen (2015) showed that the culminated achievements of these airlines in Jan. 2015, made Dubai International Airport overtake the Heathrow Airport of London, and thus, it is recognised as the busiest airport in the world. The report added that there is 6% increase in the annual collection of international passengers, which was 70 million (approx.) in the year 2014, as against least increasing rate led by Heathrow operations at near-peak capacity in terms of regulatory and space related constraints. Moreover, the analytical discussion led by Mutzabaugh (2015) states that Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar Airways are much benefited by the absence of any kind of legal or political constraints, as in the “legacy carriers” of Europe as well as the North America. It has been also mentioned that the models of state capitalism, in both economic and political development process, further add to these constraints.

In this paper, the achieve approach is to gain in-depth realisation about the aviation market and the distribution of the major airlines of the world, which are Emirates, Etihad and Qatar. The business models, along with their strategies and networking systems will be analysed for more elucidated understanding of this business domain. The technical, regulatory, and legal concepts of these airlines will be illustrated with the aim of achieving a closer and comprehensive ways knowing their business practices. Significant emphasis has been led over Emirates’ commercial co‐operation, in reference to Qantas joint service deal, Etihad’s investments in multiple carriers from diversified international markets, and Qatar’s participation in the global alliance. These selected commercial strategies get analysed with supportive illustration from Etihad’s approach in particular.

Commercial Co‐operation: Emirates

According to the records of CAPA (2013) Emirates is identified for its wide ranged and very broad international connectivity. It is a company that is getting the key position in creating competitive edge for all the other global aviation companies. The report adds that among all the major three Gulf carriers, Emirates comprises of the most mature networking functionality in the entire North American region. This is the reason that this company gains the leverage to have strong hold in aviation industry for a longer duration. the strategic approach of this company depends on its way of managing commercial co-operation with various aviation companies. CAPA (2010), refers to the established carriers networking of this company in European and the Australia market. These deals perceive the strategic approach of Emirates as strong and dynamic in the global carrier business. This happens through the increasing commercial co-operation of Emirates with Europe, North America, Asia and Australia.

Partnership Ventures

CAPA (2013 a) laid focus on the commercial co-operation of Emirates with Qantas and American Airlines. The profitability has been inscribed by this report by stating that in a couple of year there is the transformation programme, whereby Qantas avails underlying profit prior to the tax amounting 192 million AUD (or 172 million USD) for FY 2012-13. Moreover, it is important to note that Emirates still is on the form of offering cooperation rather than getting in to long-term alliances. The research initiative led by Parker and Löfberg (2009) noted Emirates for its anti-competitive elements and the ideology that through alliances, a company tends to gain artificial speed in the business. This can be referred to the relationship of Emirates with American Airlines that was led with the aim of offering more benefits to the consumers through the availability of multiple airlines.

In the same thread there is the codesharing initiated by the Emirates with Malaysian airlines (Cole, 2016). The report by Cole (2016) analyses the purpose of this commercial co-operation of Emirates to the Malaysian airlines and notes that this venture looks forward to offer more seamless kind of travel options to the passengers to 15 Malaysian cities, with convenient connectivity to Kuala Lumpur. On a reciprocate ground these travellers are also benefited by the expanded network, that comprises 90 destinations from the Middle East, Europe, America and Africa.

Futuristic Holds

Though there is no room or extensive alliances led by Emirates, yet even in the future Emirates aims to continue with its strategic approach of offering commercial co-operation to various airlines. As reported by The Emirates Group (2012) the company added seamless connections between Dubai International Airports and Lisbon. It is through the reciprocal codesharing that the customers are availed with the benefit to enjoy single-combined ticket for the Emirates as well as TAP flights as operated from Portugal. Apart from that The Emirates Group (2013) further notifies that Emirates SkyCargo along with Qantas freight are getting into partnership for gaining new trading and business opportunities. This is a partnership that is offering seamless access to the consumers from their network to other networks.

The CAPA (2013 a) report declared that in the FY 2012-13, entire international aviation commercial strategy revamped with and around the co-operations as offered by Emirates. There are competitive platforms marked from Virgin Australia. It is here that the Qantas makes some distinct progress and gains transformational international look in the aviation business, until FY 2014-15. The approach is in terms of putting these commercially equipped partners in the position of preparing extensive expansion of their routes from 2016 (Emirates, 2015)

Investments in Multiple Carriers: Etihad

Following the commercial success of Dubai in the aviation industry, the rulers from Abu Dhabi, UAE, decided to meet the economical gap by the establishment of a flag carrier meant for UAE. As in the year 2002, Qatar gets withdrawn from Gulf Air, the Abu Dhabi rulers planned to establish a new airline (Etihad, 2015 a). Initiated by a royal decree in the month of July 2003, the Etihad Airways had its first flight in November 2003 (Opu, 2010). This airline came with the commercial strategic approach of investing in the venture of getting hold over multiple carriers across the world (UAEInteract, 2003). Since then, Etihad grew with 70 aircraft to meet 80 destinations and designated itself as the world’s ‘fastest growing airline’ (Al-Sayeh, 2014). As recorded by Al-Sayeh (2014) until 2014, this airline was operating to all the continents, with extensive announcement of expanding multiple carriers in the European and Asian nations.

Increasing Stake Ownership

The commercial strategy of making investments in multiple carriers by Etihad Airways offered it with the mode of quick growth scope in a very short span of time (Etihad, 2013). By the last part of  2011 the Etihad Airways decides about increasing its ownerships in the stakes that are spread over multiple international markets. The strategy started by increasing stake ownerships with Air Berlin, and soon covered Aer Lingus (by 3%), Virgin Australia (by 20%), Jet Airways (by 24%) and Air Seychelles (by 40%) (Etihad, 2013). By 2014, this airline acquired 49% of stake ownership over newly re-launched flights of Air Serbia. This is the commercial strategy of Etihad, which allows the company to buy or invest in stakes of multiple carriers, as per ‘craft codeshare agreements’ being in its favour.

Summary

Conclusively, obvious rise and development of the three major Gulf airlines, namely Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar get noted in the international aviation market. As a result, of this the global market is in great demand of implementing exemplified or similar commercial strategies for sustainability amidst the competitive platform as created by these Gulf airlines. The study of Emirates’ commercial co‐operation, as through Qantas joint service deal; Etihad’s commercial strategy of investing in global multiple carriers; and Qatar’s decision to be a part of global alliance, show that the airline industry should start functioning in more innovative commercial way. It is highly important for all the international airlines to abide to international agreements and maintain transparent consumer–oriented service deliveries to all the stakeholders of the aviation industry.

As exemplified by the ‘Big Three’ airlines from Gulf, irrespective of operating from closely located hubs, these airlines are successful. The reason is that they follow different commercial strategies of aviation business.

• Emirates stands as the pioneer with long-haul network, fiercely dominated competitiveness, along with incumbent carriers in order to connect traffic. The partnership of Emirates with Qantas strengthens this trend of dominance, especially in the routes connecting Australia and European nations.
• As for Qatar Airways, it has been a process of meeting a huge ambition and the same gets achieved through its opening up to the global Oneworld alliance. As a result, Qatar Airways transforms its carriers into various connecting routes.
• Lastly, the commercial strategic approach of Etihad appears more outstanding. Etihad is a company that joined the bandwagon very late, yet is equally offering aggressive competitive edge to its contenders. Its success is in its decision of investing over multiple carriers with more service-led facilities and offers in both regional networks and long-haul connections, on a parallel basis.

Thus, it is to be noted that to gain positive edge of the global competitiveness, the international airlines must have right commercial strategies, as in case of Emirates and Qatar, to be specific; and follow change in both fundamental as well as strategic approaches. The basic approach of any international airline should be in creating critical customers, specifically assessed destinations, and offering innovative services and products, in order to gain competitive advantage over the selected region and attain upward mode of mobile clientele; as in the case of Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar.

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