FARNBOROUGH, England: Demand for air travel has normalized after a years-long boom following the COVID-19 pandemic as holidaymakers and travelers baulk at higher fares, executives at major airlines said at the Farnborough Airshow on Monday.

Guliz Ozturk, CEO of Turkey’s low-cost Pegasus Airlines said the airline expected yields - a measure of average fare paid per mile by each passenger - to be flat as customers go “back to basics”. Travellers are looking for the most cost effective way to travel, she said.

“We have started seeing the normalization of demand. What does it mean? I mean, the demand is there, but now the travelers are looking for, as before the pandemic, for the most affordable, the lowest, the best price for their travel,” she said.

Air India CEO Campbell Wilson said he expected the international market to moderate for the next six months, while the CEO of BA-owner IAG, Luis Gallego, said business travel was still recovering from the COVID crisis when travel almost ground to a halt with borders shut and planes grounded. The comments come after Ryanair reported earlier on Monday a bigger than expected drop in quarterly profit as fares plunged 15 percent, with management saying that ticket prices were continuing to deteriorate.

Some European airlines reported weaker than expected first quarter results, with their cost struggles set to carry over into second quarter results too. Lufthansa cut its profit target for the second time this year earlier this month. Gallego said demand was still strong for flights within Europe, but yields were under pressure, which was reflected in the Ryanair results.

The executives lamented ongoing delivery delays from planemakers Airbus and Boeing, as well as supply chain constraints. Production slots at the two dominant planemakers are sold out for many years, resulting in long wait times for airlines wishing to replace and grow their fleets.

For Pegasus, which has laid out an ambitious growth trajectory but said it would not sign any plane orders at the air show this week, Ozturk said better coordination and communication with Airbus on delays would help with planning. “Even a two, three week (delay) for a July aircraft is so critical for an airline, and they (Airbus) have to overcome this in a way, optimize the processes,” Ozturk said.

In India, there’s so much appetite for growth that Air India is robbing its own aircrafts for parts to keep other planes flying. “We have 30 aircraft on the ground for want of spare parts,” Wilson said, adding that he expected plane delivery delays to last a “good couple of years.”

Darren Hulst, Boeing’s vice president of commercial marketing, acknowledged that the manufacturer must to do better by its customers. “There’s no doubt we’ve disappointed our customers, and we’ve disappointed them, you know, over and over again, in many cases,” Hulst said, referring to delivery delays. “We need to create that stability so that we can provide not just a quality airplane, but a quality airplane when we tell our customers that it’s going to be delivered,” he added.

Meanwhile, Boeing-owned Wisk Aero expects its pilotless air-taxi to begin carrying passengers “later in the decade” as it works with the US regulator to secure approvals, its CEO said on Monday, amid skepticism among industry analysts about certification timelines. Wisk is one of several electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft makers that have emerged over the last few years with a promise to provide an environmentally-friendly mode of transport in congested cities. But the industry faces technological hurdles such as making batteries powerful enough for companies to make more trips on a single charge. They also need to convince regulators and the public that the aircraft are safe, a barrier that is higher when the aircraft is autonomous.

Wisk is developing a four-seater autonomous aircraft that will have a range of 90 miles (145 km).

“We are right now testing and producing the elements of this aircraft that we will hope to fly around the end of this year,” CEO Brian Yutko told reporters at the Farnborough Airshow.

Wisk’s strategy is a departure from other major air-taxi makers, which are developing models that will require a pilot to fly the aircraft. The company has said operators of its aircraft will save on pilot costs. But industry experts at Bain say a full autonomous passenger flight is not expected before the late 2030s and pilotless aircraft will face competition from autonomous vehicles on the road. — Reuters