Airline maintenance strategies – in-house vs. outsourced – an optimization approach

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to offer a new mathematical modeling approach to help airlines identify which types of heavy aircraft maintenance checks be performed in-house or outsourced. Design/methodology/approach – This study offers a mathematical model to minimize the total cost of heavy maintenance programs over a planning period subject to performing all maintenance programs on time and other side constraints. Findings – The results are very encouraging and somewhat counter-intuitive. The solutions recommend that more expensive and labor intensive checks be outsourced. A detailed analyses of the total maintenance cost breakdown is presented with implications and recommendation. Originality/value – To the best of the knowledge, the literature on quantitative models for airline in-house and outsourced maintenance checks is very limited. The author believes the model and airline cases presented in this paper can help airlines with their strategic maintenance strategies and will initiate further studies in this important area.