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The Mexican researcher is trying to figure out if low-cost airlines can offer low fare flights for not only short but also long distances. To do this he is developing a mathematical model.
Low-cost airlines, like Ryanair, have optimised their turnaround time, which means that very rapidly after landing the airplane is ready for take-off again. They manage to do this, among other ways, by letting people sit wherever they want, as long as they do it quickly. And they don’t have to load on a lot of meals and luggage, since these are services passengers have to pay for.
On long distance flights low-cost airlines gain less advantage from this optimised turnaround time, since the airplanes are in the air for most of the time anyway. This makes it difficult for them to compete with the other airlines.
Yet there are other factors I take into account in my model, like the fees charged by the airports, the number of companies competing on a certain line, and the potential in certain areas to tap into new travellers who until then hardly travelled by plane.
For my model I use data from the American market. I am analysing 18,000 routes via 320 airports, some of which might prove interesting. Take for example the route from Miami to New Orleans, which is now very expensive. We can get into that market, offer cheaper flights and still make a profit.
Do I sound as if I want to start my own company? Haha..no. There are strong low-cost airlines that show good profits, but as a whole the airline industry is the worst business there is to invest in. Just about everything affects it, from volcanoes to union strikes.
Airplanes are a passion of mine, though. My uncles, cousins, and many of my friends in Mexico are pilots. I wanted to be a pilot as well, but when I was 18 I was rejected because I wear contact lenses.
With my model I will also try to find out if the new Dreamliner 787 and the Airbus 350 will change things in aviation. Since they can transport more passengers, perhaps the prices can go down. And I’ll also estimate the
reductions in oil consumption and emissions with these new aircraft.
There are some low-cost airlines in Asia that already fly long distances, and although some have gone bankrupt recently, others seem to manage. I don’t know how they do it. My model might provide an answer.”
The Freelancer’s club. That’s the term we coined for our club of unemployed or rather self-employed (with no income) graduates. We have a radically free approach to our introductory meetings, much different than the Dutch-style interesseborrels. If you’re lucky, you might bump into one of us at someone’s graduation party. Lately, many fortunate grads celebrated their graduation parties at Bebop, and they were directly infused into our club. Although there’s an economic slowdown, our club is always hiring.
During our informal meetings, there’re plenty of opportunities for you to ask us questions about your future prospects and roles. But newcomers must buy drinks in honour of the older club members, a handful of creative, freelance engineers.
So, did you think your next step after graduation was to prepare for job interviews? Hang on. Your Duwo housing contract is over and it’s now time for more important interviews – instemmingen. This is planet Delft, so don’t worry that you’re inconveniencing your friend at whose place you’ve been staying ‘temporarily’ for the past couple months. Freelancing here is all about feeling free to ask and feeling free from shame.
That’s the first step. Later, as you’ll discover, freelancing is a great opportunity to finally liberate yourself from society’s conventional boundaries and step into the great unexplored. Freelance jobs include, but aren’t limited to, delivering mail, ripping off old furniture, driving delivery vans and plucking tomatoes in sweaty greenhouses.
If you like charity and donation, you, my fellow freelancer, can also help your lagging-behind pals graduate by making illustrations for their reports, making prototypes of their products or simply preparing their presentations. But do make sure you talk to them about joining the Freelancer’s club soon. During one of our recent brainstorming sessions, we enterprising club members came up with another grand idea: donating at the sperm bank. What a productive initiative.
Or were you a sophisticated, high-grade student nerd? If so, start a blog and fill it with information you gather from haunting the many (free) symposiums happening at TU. Thank you internet. It doesn’t matter if it’s a symposium on sustainability or usability, just as long as you can also get free drinks and snacks there. Yes, ‘free’ is the most important word in the Freelancer’s club.
So don’t worry if you don’t find a prospective employer. Be self-employed. It’s that simple. Many of our club members are now taking up the mantra: Start up. Yes, start your own company (with no investment of course and more probably no income). Plenty of creative ideas come up during our brainstorming sessions. After all, as engineers we learnt this long ago: Necessity is the mother of invention.
Remember, freelancing means total freedom. It means becoming self-dependent, self-employed (with no income) and self-occupied, in order to avoid becoming insanely self-indulgent.
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