Taking place on Sunday 12thMay 2013 and open to all attending delegates, The Routes Europe Strategy Summit will open the 8thRoutes Europe event which will take place in Budapest. The Strategy Summit will provide a valuable insight into aviation across the region as panels of leading industry experts take part in a number of moderator led discussions addressing key air service development issues effecting commercial aviation in Europe.

The specially developed content and interactive format ensures that the Summit is a popular element of the event with many high level speakers and panellists having already confirmed their attendance including: John Hanlon, Secretary General of ELFAA, Fernando Estrada, Strategy & Alliance Director for Vueling, François Bouteiller, CEO of Nasair, Vijay Poonoosamy, VP International & Public Affairs of Etihad Airways and Chair of IATA Industry Affairs Committee and Josef Varadi, CEO of Wizz Air who has already confirmed that he will give the keynote address.

The Strategy Summit will involve three moderator led sessions covering various aviation related subjects and The HUB can now reveal what these sessions will cover.

Session one, entitled ETS – The Big Freeze will discuss the effect that the EU freeze on ETS will have on traffic from the US and China into the EU and how it might help European airline groups.

The second session, Survival of the Fittest – Consolidation, Mergers & Alliances will ask whether the European airline market is too fragmented. Will there be further failures? This session will also look at how successful the existing mergers have been and whether they have delivered the benefits of scale. How will the recent deals between Emirates & Qantas and Etihad’s Strategic Equity Alliance impact on European carriers? Is there is room in a crowded market for regional carriers? What role do the alliances play in this new market place?

The third and final session entitled, The Future Evolution of the LCC Business Model will take a look at the evolution of LCCs which continues to change. Network Carriers are using LCCs to serve point to point markets they cannot sustain, for example Air France, Lufthansa and Iberia, many are moving away from the simple low-cost model and blending their product with tiered service levels, lounges, loyalty schemes and targeting of business travellers. Hybrid models are emerging and there is a convergence of LCC and full service models. Will long haul low cost services succeed? How will the model develop further and what are challenges do the LCCs of the future face?

Keep reading the HUB for regular updates about the Routes Europe Strategy Summit and for more information and to register click here.