Singapore Airlines has been ranked as one of the world’s top airlines for decades. In this episode of Managing Asia, Christine Tan sat down for an exclusive interview with CEO Goh Choon Phong to discuss his strategy for staying ahead of increasing competition and ensuring SIA remains a world-class airline.
Singapore Airlines has been ranked as one of the world’s top airlines for decades.
But it hasn’t all been plain sailing. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, passenger capacity for the airline plummeted from 3.4 million monthly travelers to just 11,000.
Steering Singapore Airlines through the crisis was Goh Choon Phong, a 30-year veteran who rose through the ranks and became CEO in 2011.
“There were two key objectives to ensure that we emerge stronger. One was to ensure that we have the ability to be the first off the block, to ensure that we have the ability to deploy the capacity whenever a border is opened,” Goh told CNBC’s Christine Tan in the most recent episode of Managing Asia.
“The other one is really our internal transformation program. We call it lead the new world. That is to ensure that as we emerge from the pandemic, we continue to offer industry leading services, products, and network for our customers,” Goh added.
The airline experienced remarkable growth as it rebounded from the crisis, but it wasn’t long before earnings began to come under pressure as competition rose.
“If you compare this year’s half year result relative to the previous year, indeed our yield has come down by about 7%,” Goh said.
“But if you compare the yield of the same half year result that we announced to that of the year pre-pandemic, it is still about 12% higher than pre-pandemic,” he said.
Goh Choon Phong shared how Singapore Airlines is staying ahead of rising competition, the challenges and hard lessons he has learned and how he intends to keep SIA a world class airline, in his full interview with Managing Asia’s Christine Tan.