services, has set new standards for the way we

travel. In it's 2019-2020 financial year, 56

million passengers and almost 2.5 million metric

tons of cargo flew on Emirates to over 80

countries. But like airlines everywhere, the

carrier has been battered by the coronavirus

pandemic.

Covid-19 was especially devastating to airlines like

Emirates.

When we had to ground the airline for two months,

that's unprecedented in certainly my long career in

this business, never seen anything like it. And it

was a psychological blow actually just as well as

what's a physical blow.

Covid brought Emirates to a standstill.

In November 2010, Emirates group announced half year

net losses of three point eight billion dollars.

To keep passengers safe and on board, Emirates

requires face covering for it's passengers and

crew, conducts on site rapid covid tests for

fliers, and allows travelers in economy class to

purchase the adjacent seat on their flight.

And will Emirates, with its network of over 140

destinations and its fleet of wide bodied aircraft,

be able to bounce back from the economic fallout

pummeling the airline industry?

Emirates got its start in Dubai in the mid 1980s.

With a dwindling supply of oil, and the Iran-Iraq

war impacting its shipping container business, in

1985, Dubai authorities launched Emirates Airline.

The carrier's maiden journey took place on a leased

Pakistan International Airlines Boeing 737 flying

from Dubai to Karachi.

Four years later, Emirates was traveling to over a

dozen destinations.

But it was cheap credit of the early 2000s, rising

oil prices, and an ambitious new ruler Sheikh

Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, that helped

transform the airline and the city.

And the goal was to transform Dubai into what it'd

been seeking to be for decades a link between east

and west, a place where people would stop over, but

also a place that people would stay as they began

to heavily invest into their tourism sector and

create the monuments that we now know, like the

Burj Khalifa, the Palm Jumeirah.

All of those were linked to the Emirates Airlines

strategy of getting as many people onto those

planes as possible in as short of a time as

possible.

By the early 2000s, Emirates boasted travel to more

than four dozen international destinations,

including London, Paris and Melbourne, Australia.

And it was flying to hotspots most European and

American carriers deemed too dangerous.

When I lived there, terminal two was kind of the

death terminal because that was a place that would

fly to Mogadishu, Kabul, Baghdad, Beirut.

They are willing to service places that other

airlines considered too risky.

And that's part of what Emirates Airlines tries to

do. It tries to go into places that others don't.

What Emirates realized was that as the capabilities

of aircraft were developing, not only were they

able to carry more people and cargo, but the range

was extended and Emirates realized that they could

turn Dubai into a super hub.

And while the airline industry was seeing growth

from low cost carriers like Ryanair and EasyJet,

Emirates was beefing up its cabin.

In 1992, Emirates became the first airline to

install a video entertainment system on all its

seatbacks. In 2008, it introduced the onboard

lounge for its Airbus A380 passengers.

And in 2017 debuted the world's first fully

enclosed first class private suite.

So since our inception, we have been focusing on

impeccable services and amenities throughout the

entire passenger journey.

Since our start in 1985 as well we've continued to

set the pace for innovation, luxury within the

travel industry.

I would describe Emirates as what they like to call

accessible luxury.

They want the image of luxury.

They want their airlines to look spick and span.

They want everybody to be taken care of as though

they're first class while offering fares that are

affordable for some of those developing world

customers that they're trying to seek.

Like its regional rivals, Abu Dhabi's Etihad Airways

and Qatar Airways, Emirates benefits from having a

well-funded government owner and a desirable

geographic location.

Dubai Airport is located just eight hours from two

thirds of the world's population.

Emirates is linked to Dubai's core identity.

It's part of one of its most successful brands.

And the royal family has put its full political and

economic capital into maintaining the Emirates

image as an affordable luxury airliner.

So we'll see them around for a long time.

Covid-19 has had a devastating impact on airlines

around the world, according to the International

Air Transport Association, global passenger traffic

plummeted 60 percent in 2020 to one point eight

billion travelers. Worldwide airlines in 2020 lost

118 billion dollars.

And it brought airlines to a complete standstill.

Overall, global demand fell as much as 95 percent.

It's since rebounded, but it's still far below

where it had been. Depending on the country, it's

somewhere between 30 percent and about 45 percent

of pre covid levels.

In March 2020, Emirates temporarily suspended nearly

all of its passenger flights to and from the UAE,

except for repatriation flights to about a dozen

countries. That drop in passenger traffic led to

the company's first loss in its 30 year history.

In November 2020, the Emirates group announced half

year net losses of three point eight billion

dollars. And according to analysts, Emirates, with

its ultra long haul flights, may have a harder time

moving back to profitability than many of its

competitors.

Everything that made Emirates to be so distinctive

is basically what is working against them right

now.

This is the kind of travel that almost immediately

stopped. People were worried about getting the

disease. People were worried about spreading the

disease. People were worried about catching the

disease and being in another country.

And according to analysts, long haul carriers like

Emirates face a number of difficulties, including a

drop in international business travel and a laundry

list of worldwide covid-19 travel restrictions.

What company wanted to send their employees abroad

to another country, send them to a country that's

10 plus hours away?

That demand dried up pretty much overnight by

covid.

You also have the issue that your crew and your

passengers are coming from many different

countries. So trying to understand when you are

basically checking somebody, if that person with

that particular passport is allowed to enter in a

given country is becoming a nightmare.

Another issue for the airline, unlike many of its

U.S. and European counterparts, Emirates doesn't

have a local domestic market to fall back on.

There's virtually no intra emirate flights.

There's no Abu Dhabi to Ras Al Khaimah flights that

Emirates can move into the way the domestic

carriers say in the United States or throughout

Europe were able to still move it within their own

national borders, even as the the lockdown's were

kicking in.

An additional problem for Emirates, according to

analysts, is the makeup of its fleet.

While many carriers have already transitioned to

smaller, more fuel efficient planes, Emirates

remains the world's largest operator of the Airbus

A380. The Emirates Airbus A380 can seat over 600

passengers and has a range of roughly 9000 miles.

Airbus announced an end to its A380 program in 2019

due to a lack of orders.

Of course, the aircraft aren't completely full and

therefore we are able to socially distance people

on flights, keep the crew well protected with all

the PPE that they're wearing and still doing good

standard service. And that's worked across the

whole network.

So if you have a hub, you have to have many

feeders, many routes that go to Dubai and then they

go out of Dubai.

The principle is not new.

Any airline has done that, but they did it at a

massive level to a level that nobody basically has

done it.

Emirates did, however, find some relief in cargo.

While the airline had a well-established

distribution network in place prior to the

pandemic, In April 2020 facing a surge in demand

for PPE, it stuffed cargo on seats in economy class

and in overhead bins.

It also removed economy class seats from passenger

planes, essentially converting them into cargo

planes.

At the beginning of the pandemic, we were focusing

more on the cargo side and cargo has proved to be

our sort of

surviving line, if I must say, because it has

helped us to mitigate whatever risks and losses

that we had earlier.

According to the UN's World Tourism Organization,

global tourism suffered its worst year on record in

2020, with international arrivals dropping by 74

percent. Most experts don't expect to see a return

to pre pandemic levels happening before 2023 or

perhaps later.

It's a major disruption, probably the worst we've

ever had. But goodness me, we have the wherewithal

to try and get ourselves through it and get going

again as soon as possible.

And I believe that demand will return to pre covid

levels sooner than everybody else is thinking that

they will.

In May 2020, Emirates announced 2019-2020 revenue of

twenty five billion dollars, six percent less than

the year earlier. Passenger revenue made up eighty

three point one percent of revenue.

Cargo made up twelve point three percent and non

transport services made a four point one percent.

Excess baggage made up the remainder.

So it's the mass tourism, the millions of people

that they want to be ferrying back and forth, which

that's going to have to wait for the vaccine in a

lot of places it'll have to wait for people to feel

confident enough to spend money on things like

tourism, for Emirates to take advantage of that.

While it waits for those tourist numbers to ramp up.

Emirates is also hoping to capitalize on the global

demand for vaccines.

In October 2020 Emirates, announced it was setting

up the world's largest dedicated airside hub for

covid-19 vaccines at its cargo terminal.

The airline also said it was working with major

pharmaceutical companies, including Pfizer, to

transport vaccines around the world.

It is a very high yielding thing that has been

attractive to airlines and they have been building

up facilities over the past few years so that they

can have a bigger slice of that business.

Certainly at the moment we're working on trying to

move this Pfizer vaccine in specially designed

containers on our planes, in our holds, and in the

cabins, and keeping them at that level through the

distribution point. So we have the chillers, we

have the freezers, we have the logistical control

for the airline to get these vaccines into multiple

parts of the world where others can do that.

By February 2021, Emirates had delivered millions of

vaccine doses to Egypt, South Africa, and Latin

America from manufacturing hubs in India and

elsewhere. And once the pandemic subsides, Emirates

is hoping Dubai continues to emerge as a major

tourist destination.

In March 2021, Dubai launched its vision for 2040,

which includes a 400 percent increase in public

beach areas and a commitment that 60 percent of