LONDON: During the dark days of travel restrictions, European airlines provided a neat demonstration of the limits of virtual meetings.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates predicted that more than 50 per cent of business travel would disappear, and even some senior airline industry bosses thought a significant chunk was gone forever. The prices reflect the higher cost of airline operations and flight capacity that is still lower than before the pandemic across the industry. But they also reinforce the exuberant appetite for flying.
“The theory is that because you have more remote work, people need to meet more because they don’t know each other,” he said.The future of corporate travel is economically significant. The industry claims it indirectly supported one in seven jobs worldwide before the pandemic and touted annual revenues of US$1.4 trillion in 2019.