Ethiopian Airlines: taking the wildebeest
by the horn — July 2018

Ethiopian Airlines is the largest, most profitable and commercially oriented airline in sub-Saharan Africa. It set out on a mission to offset a decline in the African carriers' share of traffic to and from the continent and has set up a successful full service network hub operation in Addis Ababa, in the Horn of Africa. Can it successfully compete against the airlines of the former colonial powers and the insurgence of the Superconnectors?

The national flag carrier of Ethiopia was established in 1945 (with help of TWA). From the start it has operated on a commercial basis — even during the Marxist-Communist era of the Derg regime in Ethiopia of the 1980s — and has consistently been one of the more profitable carriers in sub-Saharan Africa.