There have been some significant changes to the aviation sector across the Americas over the past couple of years following a period of dramatic capacity growth and airline consolidation, but respected aviation executive, Tony Davis, partner at Irelandia Aviation told The HUB at World Routes that Latin America in particular remained a tremendous market in terms of opportunity.
Irelandia Aviation provides a support function to the development of the low-cost aviation sector across the world and initiates, develops and delivers a partnership arrangement with airline management and investors. It has played a pioneering role in the development of the industry across Europe, Asia, Australia, North America and most recently in Latin America with interests in Viva Aerobus in Mexico and Viva Colombia in Colombia.
"Latin America is a tremendous market in terms of opportunity. You are seeing really good growth opportunities in terms of disposable income, GDP growth and people trading up from buses to want to fly now,” he said.
However, Davis warned there are some issues they could impact the development of the sector in the future. “Infrastructure is the big challenge,” according to the former bmibaby and Tiger Airways boss. “How do we get access to enough infrastructure at airports? How can we convince airports that they need to reflect pricing that enables us to put capacity into the market?” he questioned.
You can learn more of Tony Davis’ views on the Latin American aviation sector in our exclusive video interview from World Routes in Las Vegas, below.