ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a background on the current global industry, including a regional analysis, discusses current and future evolvement of the industry in terms of trends, discusses challenges and strategies impacting the industry, discusses the new breed of airlines, and discusses why airlines fail and what can be done to achieve success. Historically, the United States aviation industry has been the center of focus for discussions related to history, change, challenges, and strategies. In a fully deregulated environment, government controls like entry and price restrictions for air carriers are removed, allowing airlines to serve any given route and freely compete with other carriers. Airlines are important to the global economy because they link regional economies with the rest of the world. The reader will quickly learn of the many failures associated with different types of businesses in the air transportation industry.
