Code-share connectivity within global airline alliances – How much potential is utilized?

Abstract

This paper analyzes the code-share connectivity of carriers from the three global alliances: Star Alliance, Sky Team and oneworld. We generate 2-leg online and code-share connections to evaluate the existing connectivity. Additionally, we generate all potential interline connections between members of the same alliance that are not yet supported with existing code-shares and analyze what share of the potential connectivity remains unused. We find that code-share connections account to about one-fourth of the total number of international connections offered by alliance members. 73% of those code-share connections are with partners from the same alliance, 6% with carriers from competing alliances and the rest with other carriers, which means that airlines seek partnerships not only within their own global alliance but even with members of competing alliances. At the same time, over 25% of the total potential code-share connections between members of the same alliance remain unused. This connectivity potential is better utilized within the network of Sky Team and oneworld than within Star Alliance. American and European carriers show a higher degree of code-share partnership with their alliance partners than Asian carriers. Overall, code-share partnerships are strongly driven by strategic decisions on bilateral airline level. Many airline-pairs fully utilize their connectivity potential (almost half of the total existing code-share connections) but some cooperate only on selected routes or not at all. Over one-third of the remaining code-share connectivity potential within alliances is attributed to airline-pairs that don't partner at all.