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CURRENTLY operating on some of the longest sectors of any of the world's carriers, Cathay Pacific Airways pioneered a daily London — Hong Kong service in 1980 which it operated with a stop at Bahrein. A further advance was made in July, 1983 when the airline added a weekly non‐stop service from London. In May, 1984 the airline began flying from Hong Kong on a non‐stop basis for a weekly service which was operated until October when adverse weather made it necessary to keep this as a one‐stop facility. The non‐stop operation to London will however, be resumed in the middle of 1985. More evidence of the growth of long haul routes, in this case to Continental Europe, came with the start of a one‐stop operation between Frankfurt and Hong Kong which is undertaken four times a week and began in April, 1984. The airline also operates three times a week to Vancouver non‐stop from Hong Kong, which is its first service across the Pacific. Overall, the Cathay Pacific network serves 17 countries and includes destinations that range from Seoul in the north to Melbourne in the south, westward to London and east to Vancouver.

This is the last of a series of three papers discussing a benchmarking project related to the air cargo freight industry. This paper builds on the analysis covered in the second part, by discussing the gaps between various competitors and highlighting the practices that give respective competitors a key advantage in each of the specific areas scrutinised. Considers the areas of leadership, strategic quality planning, human resources management and development, process management, quality results and customer satisfaction. Notes that most organizations studied have put service at the forefront of their competitive approaches.

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) first appeared in February 2002 in China’s Guangdong Province before emerging in neighbouring Hong Kong in late February. The epidemic had a negatively profound impact on tourism around the world, with particularly strong impacts on countries in South‐East Asia. This paper will present a brief SARS chronology with critical events or impacts on Hong Kong’s tourism industry.

This paper seeks to investigate the roles of small and large projects in the development and evolution of a commercial company and why companies with a history of taking on large projects tend to eventually fail with large projects.

In terms of small and large projects, analytic models are established to: describe investors' behaviors; depict the dynamics between CEOs and their boards of directors; and reveal how profit ceilings exist for large projects.

After making the concepts of small and large projects precise, the paper establishes several analytic models for the investigation of the behaviors of various market participants. Then, it develops an explanation for why some decision makers like to take on large projects and why most new startups fail because of a lack of funds. A theory is given to show how investors value small projects more than large projects and why the current trend of moving manufacturing operations from industrialized nations to third world countries does not seem reversible in the foreseeable future, as long as international transportation costs stay low and the global economic system stays open and competitive. Among other results, it is also shown that: the higher the level the CEO's initial ability is, the more likely he would initiate and manage small projects, and the more labor effort he will devote to these projects; the CEO's additional effort spent on the small projects helps him gain non‐pecuniary benefits, which he can use to gain additional bargaining power over the board; to realistically maximize his private utility, the CEO would spend more of his time and effort on small projects; each large project has a glass ceiling for its maximum level of profits; companies taking on large projects cannot afford to devote much of their scarce resources to expand their market share and appearance; and to increase their profit potential, these companies have to control their spending so that their profit can be maximized by lowering their unit selling price p_s; for small projects, the profit potential for the company is unlimited.

This work is the first to employ models of human behaviors to research the interactions and dynamics between projects of different scales. It provides a theoretically reliable distinction between small and large projects.

This article highlights the essential factors to be considered for successful mergers and acquisitions (M & As) in the aviation industry. The article draws insights from the successful deals between Morris and Southwest Airlines as well as Cathay Pacific and Dragonair.

The article is a case study of two successful mergers in the airline industry, one in the USA and one in Asia.

M & As in the airline industry are loaded with difficulties. These include problems of brand identification, opposition from key stakeholders and the need of forming one coherent organisational culture. However, this does not mean that they are impossible. Two large-scale mergers have shown that successful mergers can occur in the industry.

This article gives examples of two successful M & A deals from the aviation industry and shows the important factors to achieve this.

It has been forecast that before the turn of the millennium air travel in Asia will account for 40 percent of global travel rising to 50 percent by 2010. The International Air Transport Association also forecast world international scheduled passenger numbers to grow by an average of 7.1 percent annually to 2000, to reach 522 million. Air wars over Asia are hotting up, with some of the world’s biggest airlines engaged in intense competition over Asian skies – potentially the richest and most lucrative air travel market on Planet Earth, notwithstanding the 1997 currency turmoil. This article looks at how competition in the Asia Pacific air travel industry was played out in the 1990s. A glimpse of what is to come can be drawn from the several tough skirmishes seen thus far in the 1990s.

Presents a series of articles on each of the following topics: digital strategy in the next millennium (Digital strategy – a model for the millennium; Searching for the next competitive edge; The technology link; Value web management opportunities; clash of the Titans: communications companies battle for new ground; and a guide through the maze); retailing and distribution in the digital era (The business case for electronic commerce; superdistribution spells major changes; VF Corp. sews up software operation; IBM seeks to harness digital revolution; Egghead’s bold move to a Web‐based strategy; achieving successful Internet banking; and enterprising uses for IT); and the changing shape of the aviation industry (boom times ahead for air cargo; United Airlines flies high through employee ownership; Asian practices to West at Cathay Pacific; and Ryannair strips to the bone).

This is the first of a series of three papers discussing a major benchmarking initiative in the air cargo freight industry sector. The project itself focused on nine major competitors in the cargo industry and included organisations known to be leaders in the areas of service excellence. The methodology used for establishing comparisons was an adaptation of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA) (1996 version). A questionnaire was used with prompts covering various areas of quality management, people involvement in continuous improvement, service excellence aspects, customer focus and satisfaction aspects and finally business and operational performance aspects. Paper 1 discusses the changes that are taking place in the air cargo freight industry and sets the scene by presenting profiles of all of the competitors used in this study.

Takes a strategic journey into the future of the airline industry and air travel. The strategic trends and profound changes that are sweeping through the world airline industry and air travel currently, as well as into the next millennium, are analysed. So too are the responses of the lead airlines that are leading the charge in shaping as well as responding to these changes, which will present new opportunities, threats and challenges to airlines with global aspirations operating on the world stage. Singapore Airlines was analysed with British Airways and United Airlines as the leading European and US comparison airlines, respectively, for comparative and benchmarking purposes.