In May 2024 Con Korfiatis was appointed Oman Air’s new Chief Executive Officer (CEO). An aviation executive with three decades of experience in the industry, Korfiatis is no stranger to the Middle East commercial aviation scene.
Between 2016 and 2023 he was the CEO of flyadeal, a Jeddah-based low-cost carrier, which is part of the Saudia group. In little more than six years and under Korfiatis’ watch, the Saudi airline has grown from zero to nearly 10 million passengers per year and a fleet of 35 aircraft, with plans to grow this number to 110 in the near future.
Prior to that, Korfiatis held several senior executive positions at airlines across Asia and in his native Australia, including Citilink, Viva Macau, Singapore Airlines, Jetstar Asia Airways, Qantas, and Ansett Australia.
“I’ve been in aviation for 30 years,” Korfiatis told AeroTime. “I went into consulting after university and had some aviation clients. I just loved the complexity of the business and felt that this is an industry, I’d like to work in long term. So, in the late 1990s I joined an airline in Australia called Ansett and I’ve been in aviation ever since.”
But what attracted Korfiatis to a career in the airline industry?
“I’ve had the opportunity to work with some great airlines in a number of different countries and cultures,” he explained. “I’ve done startups, I’ve done transformations. I have worked my way through the ranks, and I’ve also been blessed with the opportunity to work on different parts of these organizations as CFO, CCO, COO, head of network, head of strategy and CEO.”
“This has given me exposure to the totality of what this business is about,” he said. “I guess that’s why I’ve stayed in it so long. I couldn’t be happier.”
Having lived through the boom years of aviation in Asia and having later played an active part in the growth of Saudi commercial aviation, Korfiatis is bullish on the prospects for further growth in the Middle East.
“I left Australia in the late 90s and moved to the Far East, where I spent quite a few years in a few countries there. In those days, the aviation industry was going through its own boom cycle in that region,” he said. “Mind you, the Far East is still growing significantly. But that was really a boom time. It was the start of the low-cost airline industry in the region, which was developing in a way similar to what had happened in in Europe and the United States some 15-20 years earlier.”
This set the stage for Korfiatis next moves, first to a Saudi Arabia that was on the cusp of major economic and societal transformation, and, a few years later, to his current role leading the flag carrier of Oman, a country that has its own ambitious growth masterplan, called ‘Oman Vision 2040’.
“I went to Saudi Arabia in 2016, and it was not the same country that it is today,” Korfiatis said. “There wasn’t ‘Vision 2030’ [the Kingdom’s plan to transform its economy through major reforms and multi-billion investment projects – ed. note], or it was in its very early form. It wasn’t clear what the future would be like, but I could sense that there was something big in the making.”
This, Korfiatis said, is why he was excited to have come to Oman.
“I believe this region is going through what I saw in Asia back then. It’s now the time for the Middle East, which is the world’s aviation hotspot right now.”
With so much effervescence in the Middle East aviation scene, is there room for further growth?
“Growth has always been a big part of the agenda. But I guess what we’ve seen in the last four or five years is a step up in that growth,” Korfiatis said. “Saudi Arabia is coming into the global aviation environment in a big way, with significant aircraft orders. Even the more established players in the region are now going through another growth spurt.
“Yes, they’ve been growing for a long time and maybe that will go from crazy percentages to just very high ones. But they’re also sort of massively investing in taking about another set of changes. Some of those airlines will keep developing organically and more steadily going forward.”
As far-fetched as some goals may have sounded, Korfiatis noted how airlines in the Middle East have continued to prove the naysayers wrong.
“I remember being in the Far East when the Middle East was in its early, crazy growth phase, if you can call it that. At times, we were all scratching our heads, saying, ‘Where’s this going? This all looks like too much!’,” he said. “And history tells you it wasn’t. So, who am I to say now that the next step is not going to work? It’s going to be interesting.”
He continued: “I think travel will always increase. It’s human nature. And I think the world has become smaller and it continues to become smaller and better linked with what the airlines are doing. I’m a strong believer in that strong growth will prevail. Is there a level at which it’s too much? That’s a really good question. Honestly, none of us can really answer it easily. I think the fact that people are investing means there’s something there.”
A big share of this growth is the result of carriers such as the so-called MEB3 (Emirates, Qatar Airways and Etihad) leveraging their geographical location to connect different continents through a hub-and-spoke model. However, origin and destination (O&D) traffic is playing an increasingly important role, as some of these global air hubs are becoming tourist destinations in their own right.
Korfiatis appeared to be optimistic about Oman’s potential for driving this type of point-to-point traffic, highlighting how the Sultanate of Oman is one of the countries in the region with the strongest untapped potential for tourism.
“You can’t say this region is all one and the same. Our neighbors [referring to the United Arab Emirates – ed. note] built a destination in their own right, and you see other parts of the GCC [Gulf Cooperation Council] working on the same idea,” he said. “The Saudis have established ‘Visit Saudi’ to grow tourism. Oman has had tourism board for a while and, actually, does really, really well, but it’s small and the intent is to grow that and make it a bigger part of the economy.”
“That’s really our opportunity,” he continued. “It’s not that we are just well located from a transit point of view, we have an opportunity to build a point-to-point market.
Building awareness is key
The emergence of Oman as a major tourist destination is a developing story that transcends the work of one airline to encompass the whole Omani travel industry and the country’s broader economy.
Korfiatis explained how Oman Air expects to play a key role in fulfilling this vision.
“The whole ecosystem is [working] on this. We, in Oman, have built airport infrastructure which has capacity for further growth, we are building tourism assets, which also have capacity for growth,” he said. “We’re building hotels, infrastructure. We’ve announced in the last month or so five new airports that will take you to the far corners of Oman to beautiful places. “
He added: “There is so much diversity, so many experiences that you can have here. So, we want to make that more accessible. And we need to build awareness.”
When talking with Korfiatis about Oman, one thing remains clear – there is enormous untapped potential in the region, something which is only just being discovered.
“Oman can certainly punch stronger in terms of its awareness as a destination,” he said. “That’s definitely on the agenda for our whole tourism aviation ecosystem, to do that on a collective basis and maximize our efforts together to put Oman on the map.”
One of the region’s classic airlines
Founded in 1993, Oman Air consolidated its role as the national carrier of the Sultanate of Oman, particularly after the latter’s withdrawal from Gulf Air, another historical carrier of the region that currently is based exclusively in Bahrain (BAH).
However, the last few years have not been easy for the airline, which has accumulated losses. Even before Korfiatis’ arrival, the national carrier was going through a reorganization process.
Oman Air announced its plan to return to profit by 2027, a goal that Korfiatis expects to achieve with the rightsizing of operations and improving efficiencies, among other initiatives.
“There is a master plan, which has been signed off,” Korfiatis said. “I was brought in to lead the team and build the capabilities that allow us to deliver on this within the terms of the national tourism and economic agenda and Oman’s Vision 2040 program.”
“Some good steps were taken during 2023 and what I’m working on now is accelerating that. That’s what we’re going to be pushing through the balance of this year and into 2025 and 2026.”
Oman Air’s business model differs from that of other airlines where Kofiatis has previously worked.
“It’s a return to where I started my career,” he said, adding that the different aspects of a full-service model, including the complexity of different classes, food and beverage, design, and entertainment, is “lovely to have back in”.
Despite currently going through a process of change, Korfiatis noted that there are many elements of Oman Air’s current business that are worth keeping.
“From a customer point of view, it is an outstanding product and an outstanding airline,” he said. “The airline is a positive story.”
So, just how does Korfiatis plan to streamline the business?
“We are a 30-year-old airline that has never transformed. It has 30 years of legacy, and some transformation is required,” Korfiatis said. “We aim to bring that legacy into the world’s practices: productivity, efficiency, digitization, marketing, e-commerce, systems and ERPs [enterprise resource planning systems], database mining to understand our customers better and taking a data-led approach to everything we do, whether it be in front of our customers or running things behind the scenes.”
“We aim to reinvent everything that sits behind what the customer sees,” he continued. “It’s a big job. It’s a journey that will take us a few years.”
Despite having only been in the role for a few months, Korfiatis and his team are already hard at it.
“There was phase one, which was a few select things to start with. And now we’re making it more holistic, expanding these measures to cover the whole company and accelerating,” he said.
For example, Korfiatis has no desire to change the airline’s current product and was full of praise for the team.
“On the customer facing front, it’s an airline that’s been earning accolades for many, many years. I was in London receiving a Skytrax award a few weeks ago for the best airline staff in the Middle East. And you know what the competition is like in the Middle East. So that’s a hell of an accolade for the airline,” he said. “And then I found that it’s actually the seventh time Oman Air won that award. Sometimes people say one was a fluke, but you can’t fluke seven times.”
He continued: “I think our product competes with the best in the world and when I say product, I mean we are a modern airline, beautiful, great business class, great economy class. In fact, we won an award in the last two months for best seat comfort, as well.”
Omani’s renowned hospitality is another asset that Korfiatis brings up to highlight the airline’s commitment to providing excellent onboard service.
“We have a great crew as well,” he said. “People who know the region talk about the hospitality of Omanis. The airline works very hard to embody and embrace that culture. So, I guess, that’s why we get the accolades, the best airline stuff comes from that.”
“We’re proud of that,” he continued. “It’s at the core of Omani culture. It’s not just the airline, not just the aviation industry, but the whole country. And that’s something we have to make sure we never lose. We need to keep doing it, even if there’s always room for improvement.”
However, the big challenge, according to Korfiatis, is getting the word out.
“I guess the customer challenge is to just make a lot more customers aware of the fact that we exist,” he said. “We have an outstanding and beautiful destination to come and visit and we’re one of the best airlines in the world to [fly to] come here.”
But there is one area where Korfiatis believes Oman Air could do better, though, and that’s cost.
“When it comes to cost base, it is not what it should be,” he said. “For sure, there has been significant improvement in CASK [Cost per Average-Seat-Kilometer]. Cost is the enemy of any airline because it’s a very competitive world on air fares these days.
“You can’t just say, ‘well, the prices go up and costs go up, we just put the prices up and the problem doesn’t exist anymore’. Our cost per seat has to be competitive with the best in class, and that’s something we have to improve on. That will enable us to expand our footprint, it will open up opportunities to fly to where you get yield. Or you can also accept a lower yield, because of your cost basis, and that’s fine.”
Korfiatis also touched upon the revenue side of the business.
“On the commercial side, it is more about marketing the airline and the destination better than what we’ve done historically,” he said. “If I look at what we’ve done in marketing in the past, we’ve had very small budgets and done very little. So, we’re investing more heavily in this, starting this year [2024]. You’ll see a lot more of that in the second half of this year.”
The challenge of establishing awareness is a subject that comes up repeatedly during the conversation, not just for Oman Air as a carrier, but for the country as a destination.
“It’s more about getting people who aren’t aware and are considering other options to choose Oman,” Korfiatis said. “Why would they choose us is a big part of it. It’s awareness, it’s marketing, it’s branding. And it’s building the customer base.”
Quality over quantity
However, Oman Air is not looking to increase traffic volumes at any cost.
“We lost some of our connectivity because of the capacity rationalization for the summer schedule,” he said. “That wasn’t an accident, it was intentional because in any transformation you need to consolidate and build up your foundations.
“If you’re running flat out, pouring capacity on top of it, you don’t achieve the best results. So, even though load factors might have been a bit better before, the bottom line is improving due to the schedule changes. We were ‘buying’, if you like, some of this traffic, but our cost was higher than what we were getting in return, and this doesn’t make good business sense.”
He added: “It allowed us to push away volume that wasn’t making sense because it wasn’t the right yield for the product we offer. Once we fix all of this, we will go back into expanding with the same fleet and keeping it efficient, with a lower seat cost.”
Korfiatis also shared some insight about Oman Air’s fleet rationalization, which saw the airline phasing out its Airbus A330s in March 2024.
“It’s also about right sizing, simplifying the fleet. We had two different widebody types and within those, there were three different configurations,” he said. “And on a small fleet of widebody aircraft, it was just an insane complexity. On the one hand, we have modern fuel and cost efficient 787s, but the other half of the widebody fleet were aging A330s.”
So, what is Korfiatis’ vision for the future of Oman Air’s fleet?
“We have 737 MAXs and we have the (737)NGs, -800s and –900s,” he said. “By mid-2026, the NGs will have left the fleet and we’ll then become a full 787 and 737 MAX operator. There’s going to be commonality and a single flight type within both the wide body and the narrow body fleets.”
When it comes to the product Oman Air offers its passengers, Korfiatis said he plans to keep those elements that are working well, although he has not ruled out some changes.
“As we’re turning over every stone in the business, these are also things we have to look at, but I do see ourselves staying in full service, providing a high-quality product,” he explained. “Within that definition, there’s quite a wide bandwidth within which you can play. That’s something we’ll be having a look at in the months ahead.
“We definitely have a very strong two-class product. At some point, we’ll look at whether a Premium Economy makes sense, but we have no plans for this now. We are certainly very well invested in very high-quality business class and economy class products, and we see that recognized by the industry. That’s the core of our customer proposition. We have first class in only two aircraft. Honestly, I’m not sure that, given the demographic of our airline, that’s the right thing for us in the long term. That’s something we’re looking at.”
At the moment, Oman Air’s traffic is balanced between transit and point-to-point traffic.
“I can tell you, they’re both very sizable segments. They’re both important to the airline. If we only had transit, it would not be enough and if we only had point-to-point, it also wouldn’t be enough,” Korfiatis explained while referring to Muscat International Airport (MCT), which was redeveloped in 2018, as another element that Oman Air can leverage to offer a differentiated experience.
“We do have an intentionally structured transit product and a meaningful number of the people flying with us today use Oman for transit. We want it, it’s not by accident, it’s part of the business case,” he said. “I don’t know if you’ve ever done a transit at Muscat (MCT). It’s not a congested airport. It’s got one of the best OTPs [on-time-performance] in the region.”
He added: “We’ve built the capacity ahead of the demand, so unlike many of the airports in the region, which are bursting at the seams, it’s a very convenient airport to transit through. It’s quick and efficient. The feedback we get from our customers on the transit experience is extremely positive. So, we can definitely say ‘yeah, we’re different. But different in a good way, in a better way.”
Next, Korfiatis talked about the airline’s O&D traffic, describing the three main demographics the airline serves: the local Omani outbound market, the inbound tourists, which, Korfiatis said, is slightly tilted towards the premium end of the market, and the expatriate community living in Oman, with many of them coming from the Far East, from South Asia.
“Our current network is reflective of that,” he added. “We fly to the Far East, to South Asia, to Europe and we have a small presence in the African continent.”
Korfiatis ruminated on the prospects of China as a strategic market for Oman Air once the airline resumes growth.
“That’s a huge tourist market with completely unexploited potential,” he said, before outlining a few more possible vectors of expansion. “We have a fantastic location geographically for access to Africa. So, I see opportunities in Africa going forward. South Asia also has lots of opportunities and, of course, Europe. We’re only touching a handful of places in Europe, and we believe we can bring in people from many other places into Oman.”
Two major markets currently not in Korfiatis’ plans, though, are the US and Australia.
“I think our 787s would probably have huge payload limitations to go to Australia and, honestly, there’s so much to do in other markets at the moment, it would be a distraction to try go that far away,” he said. “But we do have interest in exploring those markets. We can reach them through partnerships.”
In this regard, Korfiatis mentioned the recent entry of Oman Air into the oneworld Alliance, which will is projected to be formalized in H2 2024.
“This gives us two key things: first, access to a network platform. We can reach places far away and connect through our partners where we don’t have the aircraft to do it ourselves,” he said. “Second, customer recognition and the benefits of coming into that program for our customers. It’s not just about the money, when they travel with our partners they will be recognized by their status and treated the same way as they would on Oman Air. These are two big positives and big wins for our customers.”
Oman Air cooperates in some areas with Salam Air, a Muscat-based low-cost carrier.
“It’s independent from us, but we do have some cooperation and we try to see where we can help each other,” Korfiatis explained. “There’s some overlap in our route structure, but there’s also a number of routes where we fly alone, and they fly alone. There is some competitive element. I wouldn’t say it’s zero, but I think it’s more a partner than a competitor.”
What’s next for Oman Air?
When it comes to Oman Air’s next milestones, Korfiatis insisted for the need to follow what he descried as a “measured” approach, where he will try to consolidate the airline’s current standing in the market before embarking on any major new projects.
“Don’t expect any new aircraft orders, not in the next six months or 12 months at least,” he said. “We’ve got to focus on our transformation and on fixing our foundations. There’s nothing we want to get in the way of that.
“We will look at the product going forward, over the next six months. Whether there’s anything that comes out of that, we’ll see. We do have some deliveries still pending in our existing order book: three B787s and three B737 MAX arriving this year, and two more MAXs arriving in the first six months of 2025. We’ll also think about the future of our existing 787 fleet, particularly our –8s, because we’ve got two of those. We certainly will be keeping our -9s. It’s a work in progress. I don’t have a definite answer right now.”
“When it comes to the network, we’ve been operating some summer routes and we’ve been incrementally increasing frequencies here and there, but there’s no shotgun announcement coming or anything big planned at the moment,” he continued. “I expect there’ll be some incremental capacity coming up but it’s a modest percentage growth. So, yeah, nothing crazy. It’s a measured approach. I think it is wise.”