STRATEGY A Time of great flux - Swissport · A Time of great flux International customer journal...

STRATEGY ■ Total airport management

A Time of great flux

International customer journal

Swissport International Ltd., Issue 7, Spring 2001

The more complex an issue gets,the greater is the need for simplesolutions. And the more complexground handling becomes, themore our customers are coming toseek simple overall approaches tomeet their needs throughout thevalue-adding chain. Swissportwas quick to realise that and isalready transforming itself into a“Total Value Chain Provider”.

“CHANGE BE FORE you haveto”, they say. But in the aviation busi-ness that means not just changing intime, but changing ahead of the pack,and showing others the way in yourchosen business area. That’s why,while most ground handlers are stilloccupied with the key issues ofderegulation, liberalisation and globalconsolidation,Swissport Internationalhas already moved on to the nextmajor step – assuming responsibilityfor the entire value-adding chain, andbringing valuable diversification intoits product range.

Change is in the air…Everyone involved in ground han-dling is constantly on the lookout foroptimised processes, value-addingopportunities and the best possible

solutions to a particular problem. Indoing so, they often have to face somekey decisions – outsourcing versus in-house production, or one-stop shop-ping versus ad-hoc procurement – andthey need to tackle key challengessuch as pricing pressure and main-taining quality levels. All in all, it’s atime of great flux in the ground han-dling world.

… but basic needs staythe sameAt the same time, though, the basicvalues and wishes of the various mar-ket players are unlikely to radicallychange.The list of key business needstends to stay largely the same: quality,trust, sustainability, flexibility, indi-viduality, innovation, speed,as smootha journey as possible through the va-rious airport formalities, customerfocus, skilled and qualified staff, safetysecurity, and so on. They’re all vitalattributes that we all want and need.And we’ll continue to do so.

But the more complex our groundoperations become, the more thedemand grows for simple solutionsthat can deliver all these basic musts– clear, pragmatic solutions whoseobvious benefits make them a winner

from the start. At Swissport, we’vebeen well aware of the appeal andpotential of Total Airport Manage-ment for some time now. So the stepfrom simple ground handler to TotalValue Chain Provider is a clear andlogical one to take.

These are not just fine words, by theway.As the latest developments show,Swissport is tackling ground servicesin a radical new way, by increasinglyadopting the role of general contractorin the whole ground handling process.

It’s an approach that’s reflected in ourcurrent Business Plan and our presentstrategic thrust. And it’s a goal we’llbe steadily working towards over thenext few months. For a concreteexample of the products we’re devel-oping for our Total Value ChainProvider role and the benefits theycan offer you, see the report on Page2 with the creation of two new com-panies “Checkport” and “Nextport”.This and our other current endeav-ours are a visible reflection of theSwissport philosophy of focusing onone clear step at a time: a step for-ward… and a step ahead of the rest!

Stephan Beerli

STEFAN RESELEQuality assurance and innovation cango hand in hand. In his article, StefanResele describes how Swissport‘sOperations unit is pooling the exper-tise of over 15 000 employees for”best practice” approaches. 9

B E S T P R A C T I C E

F R A N C E

L I B E R A L I S A T I O N

S O U T H A F R I C A

JAN T INDEMANSIt’s a good hundred days now sinceSwissport France was born of themerger of existing successful groundservices providers. Jan Tindemans,the company’s President and CEO,talked to us about the obstacles theyhave had to overcome, their successesso far, and their strategies for tomorrow.

6–7

FERNAND STAUFFERSouth Africa is not an easy place todo business. But Swissport SouthAfrica and its highly motivated teamhave established themselves well inthe local ground handling market. It’staken hard work and determination;but it’s a solid basis on which FernandStauffer, the new CEO, will now beable to build. 12–13

ERNEST E ISNERErnest Eisner, Executive Vice PresidentHandling Services at Vienna AirportAG, is a straight talker. Even the moresensitive liberalisation issues are farfrom taboo for this experienced expertin the ground services field. 14–15

2 Swissreporter – The Swissport customer journal ■ Spring 2001

I N N O VAT I O N

appear on airport check-in concourses.The machines, which have beendeveloped in a joint venture with twotop specialist partners, check in busi-ness and charter passengers swiftlyand efficiently.

Easy to useEasy to use and inexpensive to installand maintain, the NEXTPORT self-service check-in machines look all setfor success. They have also provedimpressively reliable. And eachmachine can be monitored and main-tained anywhere in the world from acentral control station.

For airports largeand smallNEXTPORT is equally suitable forairports handling large volumes oftravellers and those with smaller pas-senger flows. The machines can alsobe combined with other systems –such as car park payment machines orlounge access controls – to createtotal self-service solutions for thesevarious airport processes.

Urs von Euw

CHECK-IN ■

New reliable self-service systems

NEXTPORTsimplifyingcheck-inproceduresSaving time and money is a popularactivity. Through its cost-effectiveNEXTPORT self-service check-inmachines, Swissport aims to bothease the pressure of daily han-dling peaks and create genuine timegains for travellers. And with itsstate-of-the-art technology, NEXT-PORT could well be the face of thecheck-in of tomorrow.

VAR IOUS TECHNOLOGIEShave been developed over the pastfew years to enhance airport services,and many of these have focused onpassenger and baggage check-inoperations. Individual devices such asmobile phones and self-servicemachines are likely to figure moreand more prominently on check-inconcourses in the months and yearsahead, speeding up the process andproviding passengers with more timeand a smoother check-in procedure.

NEXTPORT arrivesSwissport was quick to establish itselfin this exciting new field. And fromthis summer on, its new NEXTPORTself-service machines will begin to

S T R A I G H T A S S E R T I O N S – S T R A I G H T A N S W E R S

Joseph In Albon, President & CEO of Swissport International, responds to three key claims

C L A I M 1 : Swissport has experienced explosive growth – from three to 130 stations in just four years. But it’sjust getting bigger, not better, because speed is detrimental to quality!Joseph In Albon: You can’t have one without the other: you can’t say yes to deregulation, liberalisation and globalconsolidation if you’re not prepared to move ahead yourself. And quality is crucial to this overall growth strategy ofours.We know how vital speed is, too.That’s why we pay so much attention to our service levels, through our standards,our training, our ISO quality certifications and more.

C L A I M 2 : Swissport has achieved its top position by introducing innovative features such as “Plus10”. But theairlines are actually more interested in getting the lowest possible handling rates.

I’m convinced that our customers don’t just go for the cheapest price. Value for money is what they want. We keep optimising our processes and our tech-nologies; and in doing so we don’t just raise our service quality, we drive down the costs for our customers as well. We’ll continue to maximise transparency,too, especially where our competitors are operating below cost price or where it becomes apparent that they are trying to “buy” market share.

C L A I M 3 : In view of the new situation for Swissair and the Qualiflyer Group, Swissport will lose a large part of its customer base and thus becomeless important. Are you already looking for new alliance partners?Some 80 per cent of our present turnover is generated by our top 50 customers. It’s only natural, given our Swiss home market, that Swissair andCrossair are two of our biggest single clients. But we’ve always seen ourselves as global players, not as “purveyors to the Qualiflyer Group”. Whateverdirection Swissair and its alliances take, we’ll continue to offer optimised ground handling solutions for all. Features like price, service, quality and skill aren’treserved for any one alliance. We’ll fight for every unhappy customer; and we’ll celebrate every new client we gain.

ity.But the new joint venture betweenSwissport International and CGS willmake inadmissibles handling part ofthe total ground services product.Pro-ject Checkport offers a powerfulblend of CGS’s expertise in the docu-ment checking field and SwissportInternational’s global network, infra-structure and distribution channels.Both partners are convinced thatCheckport has massive cost savingspotential,once the airlines can be sen-sitised to the problem and the costs itcan cause.The project should make itsoperational debut in May or June.

Cost transparencyCheckport should help airlines min-imise their inadmissibles costs.It shouldcreate genuine cost transparency, too:at the moment, the airlines often havelittle idea of what an inadmissibleactually costs them in dollar-and-centterms, though some European carri-ers estimate the costs of inadmissiblesat around USD 40 million a year.Checkport will provide its own per-formance transparency, too: its effec-tiveness can be clearly measured bythe number of inadmissibles who stillremain undetected until they arriveat their desired destination.

Andreas Müller

“INADMISSIBLES” ■

Shedding light on an expensive issue

Checkporttackles thecost of INADsAirlines pay tens of millions ofdollars a year for “inadmissible”passengers – travellers who arerefused entry to their country ofdestination – in fines, return ticketsand associated costs. So Swissporthas teamed up with CustomerGround Services Ltd. to create ajoint-venture company that willtackle this often-overlooked aspect.

I S S U E S T H AT T E N D to getneglected in the broader picture areoften worth looking at in a little moredetail.To get a clearer idea of the realcosts incurred through “inadmissible”passengers, Swissport Internationalhas set up the “Checkport” project, ajoint venture with Customer GroundServices Ltd. (CGS) of Zurich. Theaim of the project: to tighten up docu-ment checks and thereby reduce boththe numbers of inadmissibles and thecosts they generate – in the form oftickets to return them to their place ofdeparture, the cost of looking afterthem before this can be done, the finesthat are levied by the authorities andthe delays these procedures can entail.

Document checks, passenger inter-views, inadmissibles handling andpre-departure screening are not tradi-tionally a core ground handling activ-

offers, among other things, a pre-mium stocked bar, international tele-

vision access, and Internet and e-mailfacilities. Paying attention even tominute details is, of course, labour-intensive; but then again, we are notdealing with regular aviation clientshere. Our customers are special andthey know it. They expect to be pam-pered – and they will be!

For Swissport Executive Aviation, thebright market forecast offers anexcellent basis for exploiting marketopportunities. To do this, we have toconcentrate on global commitmentand market penetration with theSwissport Executive brand, and onthe effective use of corporate resour-ces to globally implement servicestandards of excellence. The futurelooks bright for the industry; andSwissport Executive Aviation is de-termined to seize the opportunity.

Pierre Guggenheim

The Swissport customer journal ■ Spring 2001 – Swissreporter 3

N E W B R A N D

aircraft is diminishing. On the con-trary, the order books are full.As oneindustry source puts it: “Executiveaviation is the ultimate form of com-munications in the 21st century.”

MilestoneFebruary 1, 2001 marked anothermilestone in the history of Swissport

International:with the commencementof its services at Nice, France, Swiss-port Executive Aviation has joinedthe family of ground handling com-panies under the Swissport umbrella.While we already have some very suc-cessful executive business operationsin several locations, the Nice operationis the first to enter the marketplaceunder the new brand. The new unit isa joint venture between Swissport andUniversal Weather & Aviation, Inc.

Our growth strategy is based on severalfactors. One of these is the choicebetween a go-it-alone course, a part-nership/ joint venture arrangementand a strategic alliance, depending onmarket conditions. At Nice we foundthe ideal start-up environment: thecorporate expertise of our partner,Universal Weather & Aviation; adesirable location with internationalname recognition; excellent manage-ment and infrastructure; the avail-ability of an operator’s licence withSwissport France; and a great humanresource base. We are convinced thatwe will swiftly gain a circle of clientsat Nice and, with it, the market sharewe seek.

The customers of SwissportExecutive Aviation areprimarily corporateand flight opera-tors, corporate charter companies andprivate jet owners. By providing effi-cient and consistent service excel-lence, and with a personnel team thatis friendly, sincere and genuinely keen

to serve, Swissport Executive Aviationis confident of gaining the business itdesires, not only at Nice but at otherlocations, too. It is to this end that thenew company has implemented satis-faction feedback programmes fromthe very beginning, to help furtherrefine the various services it offers.

Statistics prove potentialTotal flight movements for the Niceservice provider market stand at 3800a year and rising.Swissport ExecutiveAviation will be supplying the samebasic service as its competitors (suchas they are): towing,marshalling, rampsupport and service coordination andpassenger and crew handling, includ-ing all entry and departure formalities.Swissport goes beyond that, though,with an attentive,personalised servicealong with a counter facility for pas-sengers and crew.

Providing a service that caters for along-standing need from the startclearly gives the new company a com-petitive edge.The lounge operation atNice will also serve as a prototype forfuture locations, providing the verybest in ambience and guest comfort. It

“You land. We take care of therest.” – With the start of its servicesin Nice, France, Swissport ExecutiveAviation has begun to put thephilosophy behind its slogan intopractice. Under its new brand,Swissport has made further inroadsinto a highly quality-conscioussegment of the market wherecustomers expect to be pampered.And pampered they will be!

TODAY’S EXECUTIVE aviationindustry is undergoing a transformationfrom mostly single owners andoperators to consolidated serviceproviders or corporate flight depart-ments. In the USA alone, it’s anindustry that’s worth over USD 19billion a year; and that figure is grow-ing, too. Passenger numbers areequally astounding: they exceed the120 million mark. After all, privateand executive aircraft can reach manymore airports than commercial flights.

In addition to being a much-neededservice provider, the executive avia-tion industry is reacting to today’sbusiness environment by making air-craft ownership and participation alot less costly via its fractional owner-ship programmes.Rather than one indi-vidual owner/operator incurring allthe costs,the programmes offer multipleownership (up to eight parties per air-craft) while still providing all the con-veniences and benefits of executive airtravel to individuals or corporations.

There is a clear trend towards largeraircraft in the sector, too.Both Airbusand Boeing now offer jets in VIP/corporate configuration that are basedon commercial aircraft platforms.Notthat the need for other executive-type

EXECUTIVE AVIATION ■ Putting a philosophy into practice

Off to aa ggrreeaatt ssttaarrtt

FA C T S A N D F I G U R E S O N G E N E R A L AV I AT I O N

European aviation statistics

Business jet operators 615Business aircraft 861Handling agents and FBOs more than 150Flight caterers more than 70Fuel companies more than 15Flight planning companies more than 10Ground transportation companies more than 150

N I C E – J E A N - L U C PAY O T

Jean-Luc Payot, General Managerfor Swissport Executive Aviation,has some enthusiastic commentson the early days of the new op-eration in Nice: “We could hardlyhave had a better start.The marketis there; we know we can gainmarket share by offering top quality;and customer feedback has beenvery encouraging so far. The ex-ecutive aviation market is a lucra-tive niche that also offers a goodchance for smaller airports suchas Nice, especially since thismarket has excellent growth pros-pects.”

C O N TA C T

Pierre GuggenheimGlobal Project LeaderSwissport Executive AviationPhone: +41 812 77 84Fax: +41 811 10 [email protected]

Talking, listening, learning – that’swhat’s on the agenda for thisyear’s IATA Ground Handling Con-ference (IGHC), which will be heldin Hong Kong from May 6 to 11.Swissport will be well representedas usual, giving customers and col-leagues an excellent opportunityto check in and catch up with2001’s “Global Ground Handler ofthe Year”.

H O N G K O N G is the venue forthis year’s IGHC, one of the biggestevents on the ground handling calen-dar.The Conference offers a welcomeforum for key players and decisionmakers in the ground handling sectorto look at industry trends and issuesfrom a range of standpoints and per-spectives. Alongside the vast amountof practical information and interest-ing presentations, one of the primefunctions of the IGHC will again beto bring the specialists together toswap experiences and expertise.

An attractive programmeWith last year’s IGHC in Dubai stillfresh in people’s minds, the HongKong event offers another attractiveprogramme for the 700-odd peoplewho are expected to attend.SwissportInternational will be much in evi-dence again, presenting its latest

innovations. And if our delegateshave an extra spring in their step thisyear, that’s because we’ve just beendeclared 2001’s “Global GroundHandling Company of the Year”.

In fact, the IGHC is inked into theSwissport calendar from one year tothe next, as is clear from the presenceand the programme we intend to pro-vide:■ all present: every one of our

Country/Marketing Managers willbe there;

■ top brass: our Executive Manage-ment will also be on hand fortop-level discussions;

■ campaigns:we’ll be presenting ournew global image and productcampaigns;

■ latest: we’ll have details of newopenings and cooperation agree-ments;

■ VIP event: we’re planning a fabu-lous programme for our VIP after-noon;

■ documentation: we’ll be armedwith a wide range of documentswith useful tips and hints, alongwith a few surprises;

■ sponsorship: we’ll be much inevidence as a sponsor, too – of theMacao golf event, for example.

A chance for contact There’s nothing Swiss-port likes more thanmeeting customersand colleagues fromthe ground handlingworld. So our wholeIGHC team will betaking extra timeto talk to you person-ally, listen to yourcomments and con-cerns, and discuss thehottest ground han-dling issues. See youthere!

Stephan Beerli

I N D U S T RY E V E N T

Swissport International is seeking talentedindividuals capable of managing groundhandling units around the world.Our

General Managers• are entrepreneurs who can lead an

international business unit into a prosperous future.

• possess managerial skills in ground handling, finance, marketing,and human resources.

• can inspire others to excel by setting a good example and by delegatingresponsibility.

If this sounds like the kind of challengeyou’ve been looking for, send an e-mail right now to Peter Graf, VPHuman Resources, Swissport Inter-national Ltd. at [email protected]

Make the world of Swissport your world of career development opportunies.

We are currently inviting applications for general management positions.

* “Global Ground Handling Company of the Year 2001”Accredited by the ITM Air Transport Committee

IGHC HONG KONG ■ The annual

get-together for the ground handling world

A strongSwissportpresence atthe IGHC


GroundSpeed, the delay-cuttingmodule in our Plus10 customerprogramme, has been in opera-tion for one year now. Timeenough, then, to take stock of thispromising innovation. The result?Delays slashed for carriers, costssaved, and sizable goodwill gen-erated among the passengersinvolved.

THE GROUNDSPEED servicemodule in our Plus10 customerprogramme is based on clearly quan-tifiable principles. The whole pro-gramme is founded on giving a speci-fied ‘minimum ground time’ to everyaircraft type, monitoring any flightthat arrives late and seeing how longit takes Swissport to turn it around.If the actual turnaround time is belowthis ‘minimum ground time’, thesavings in minutes are recorded andreported to the customer.

Cost-saving catch-upConservative estimates suggest that asingle hour’s delay costs some USD1100, through extra personnel costs

(overtime or additional staff), missedconnections, inconvenience paymentsand the like. Naturally, these costsvary from region to region. All in all,GroundSpeed looks set to recouparound 7300 hours of delays a year forits client airlines. So in money terms,Swissport will save its customersaround USD 8 million – quite anachievement at a time when carriersare battling for every revenue franc.

After a rather disappointing 2000,the aerospace B2B market is aboutto turn 2001 into a year of conso-lidation, content and new strate-gies. The key players are readyfor the next stage.

T H E B A S I C S A R E clear:Internet marketplaces bring buyers andsellers together. The aim is to offervalue-added business services andtransaction capabilities, and present aforum for increasing process efficien-cies within the industry. If early 2000was rich in announcements and poorin the development of independentdotcoms in the aerospace B2B mar-ket, 2001 looks set to see the consoli-dation of electronic marketplaces inthe aviation industry and a period ofbuilding content, formulating strate-gies and establishing business lines.

Key players’ platforms■ Cordiem (formerly Airnewco):www.cordiem.com

common phenomenon, it can have amajor impact, not only on the supplierbut also on the buyer’s organisation.But for this to happen, the platformswill all have to fulfil three basicrequirements: liquidity, functionalityand neutrality.

Next stepsSwissport and Swissport Fueling willbe offering a forum and discussionplatform for the airport services andfuelling business lines in various mar-ketplaces. This is, we feel, essential:the industry must come closer togetherto discuss, describe and formulatethese services.


P L U S 1 0

GROUND SPEED ■ Taking stock after one year

USD 8 million in savings!But just as important as the time andcash saved is the goodwill among pas-sengers that these efforts engender.That can’t be measured in dollars; butit can have a massive impact on theimage the carrier enjoys.

Regional differencesGroundSpeed’s regional results todate make interesting reading, too.Top of the league in terms of totalflight movements and total minutesrecouped is Europe, followed bySouth America.A closer look revealseven more fascinating details: most ofthe minutes regained are at destina-tions where traffic volume is quieterthan at the major hubs. The classicscenario seems to be that a flightleaves a hub with a delay, but thedelay can then be made up (or at leastreduced) during turnaround at itsnon-hub destination.

North America is noticeably absentfrom the results.This is because in thisregion the estimated time of depar-ture is determined by the carrieraccording to the current situation. So

responsibility for getting the flight offon time doesn’t rest with Swissport.But,needless to say,Swissport does itsutmost in North America, too, to han-dle its flights as swiftly as possible andmeet all its customers’ wishes.

The GroundSpeedspecialist is bornGroundSpeed has made waves with-in Swissport, too. The promotion hasprompted some spirited competitionamong staff,and has even given rise to‘GroundSpeed specialists’ with a par-ticular flair for shaving minutes offturnaround times. Some customershave even approached Swissport toask how they could improve theirhandling elsewhere.

All in all, the highly positive feedbackit has received has encouraged Swiss-port to both expand its GroundSpeedoperation and reward its high-per-forming employees.

Peter Beutler

“E-BIZ” ON THE INTERNET ■ Consolidating electronic marketplaces

Industry goes B2BThe founding members are AmericanAirlines, Air France, British Airways,Continental Airlines,Delta Air Lines,Iberia, SAirGroup (Swissair), UnitedAirlines and United Parcel Service.■ Aeroxchange:www.aeroxchange.comThe founding members are Air Canada,All Nippon Airways, America WestAirlines, Cathay Pacific, FederalExpress (FedEx), Japan Airlines,Lufthansa, Northwest Airlines, Scan-dinavian Airlines System (SAS) andSingapore Airlines. There are also anumber of other airlines with con-firmed equity participations.■ Aerospan: www.aerospan.comOriginally formed in cooperationwith AAR, the site is now principallyrun by SITA with AAR maintaining asmall equity stake.■ Exostar: www.exostar.comThe four founding strategic partnersare BAE Systems, Boeing, LockheedMartin and Raytheon.CommerceOnealso owns a stake in the exchange.

Today’s business linesThe prime business lines offered onthe major platforms are maintenance& engineering (M&E), catering &cabin services, fuel & fuel services,airport support services and generalprocurement. Most marketplacescurrently offer M&E, catering & cabinservices and fuel services. Airportservices will follow at a later stage.

It is vital that ground handlers do notmiss the chance to participate in thecreation of their business segment onthese platforms. Swissport will keepyou informed of all developmentsthat affect the business lines of theairport services sector.

Each company has to devise its ownstrategies towards B2B marketplacesand sort out the winners from thelosers. Consolidation is likely to dras-tically reduce the number of competi-tors within the next twelve months.Once the B2B process becomes a

C O N TA C T

Axel J. TuellmannSwissport International Ltd.CH-8058 Zurich AirportPhone: +41 1 812 93 00Fax: +41 1 811 10 [email protected]

Top airports fortotal GroundSpeeddelay savings:

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

ManausFortalezaJohannesburgDalamanAnkarahours

Swissport France, the ground ser-vices company formed through theteam-up of key industry partners,has enjoyed some sizable successin its home French market since itstarted operations on January 1.Jan Tindemans, its President &CEO, talked to us about those firstfew weeks and the changes theyhave brought.

Swissport France has had its firsthundred days now. How would youcharacterise your experiences duringthat time?

Jan Tindemans: Well, we’ve certainlyhad our challenges to master! I’ll giveyou just one example – which actuallydates from a little earlier – to showyou the difficulties we’ve faced and

the progress we’ve made.When I tookon this job, in June 2000, Air LittoralAssistance was quite a different oper-ation. The “matey” style that wasaround then has been superseded bya highly professional approach.

We’ve become a lot bigger, too, ofcourse. And it’s not just our profes-sionalism that’s improved;it’s our quality aswell. Of course,when

you grow so quick-ly, you’re bound toattract some neg-ative commentsalong the way, espe-cially in the earlystages: Swissair and Sabena weren’ttoo happy with our performance inNice, for example. But that’s all dis-appeared, too.

So do you feel your teething troublesare behind you now?

Definitely. Our outstations are nowISO 9002 certificated, and we nowhave an organisation that worksexceedingly well. And we’ve got thefigures to back up those claims: thisJanuary we recorded 98.8 per centpunctuality – quite an improvementon the less than 93 per cent our pre-decessors posted for January 2000.And we achieved that result withmore than double the customer vol-ume. So as you can see, we’ve reallypulled our socks up.

And how do these results translateinto dollars and cents?

Well, you’ve got to post a positiveresult if you’re going to survive. Andwe’ve certainly made massive pro-gress in terms of the profitability ofour operations.All in all, I’d say we’renow a going concern. And we’re see-ing a very encouraging increase in thenumber of new customers we’reattracting.

So how would you summarise yourfirst hundred days?

I’d say it’s been a bit of a triple jump:more professionalism,betterquality and higher profit-ability. But there’s some-thing else I’d like tomake a point of men-

tioning. We madea very careful anddeliberate decisionto adopt the Swiss-port France brand.Air Littoral Assis-

tance was already a well-knownname.But they were really only famil-iar to customers in the south ofFrance. Swissport France is a groundhandler who wants to be activethroughout the French market, andhave a presence to match.

What we’ve noticed, though, is thatnobody – neither our customers northe airport authorities – uses the oldname any more. That’s really quiteamazing in such a short space of time.I think we took a lot of steps to helpthe process along, like the big eventwe held on January 11. But it’s beenreally worth it: establishing the Swiss-

port France brand is extremelyimportant in terms of our corpo-rate image. Because a strongidentity and a strong marketpresence can really help usattract new customers.

What are your current objec-tives?


S W I S S P O R T E U R O P E

SWISSPORT FRANCE ■ The first hundred days

Professionalism, quality and

“It’s been a bit of a triple jump:more professionalism, better quality

and higher profitability.”

Customer contact: there isnothing more contagious thana friendly, smiling face.

In the medium term – by around 2002– we want to be one of the top threeground handlers in France,along withADP and Air France. That’s a totallyrealistic scenario. At the momentwe’re number five.

As I said, we’re gaining more andmore new customers, so expansion ison the agenda, too. We’re looking atNantes and Bordeaux right now. ButParis is still very much at the centre ofour future plans. We want to be asstrongly focused on Paris as we cur-rently are in Nice. We’re alreadyworking on building up our opera-tions at Charles de Gaulle’s Terminals2 and 9, and we recently received thelicence to operate at Terminal 9.

What airports are you currentlyactive at, and what could you tell usabout those various locations?

We have six stations at present. Tak-ing them one by one, Nice is clearly amajor hub in the south of France forthe entire SAirGroup. Marseille hasseen a rapid growth in our customernumbers from seven to 35. Montpellierhas felt little change so far, but thesituation there is stable.Toulouse hasexperienced substantial growth – notleast because Airbus Industrie is alocal neighbour. Lyon is expected togrow, too, though to a more moderatedegree: this is a place where we needto intensify our customer care. And,as I said, Paris Charles de Gaulle is akey focus of our future operations,and our hopes for its growth are cor-respondingly high.

And what locations are you concen-trating on right now?

Our real “engines” at present areParis and Nice. Nice, of course, is gett-ing a lot of attention because of the

launch of Swissport Executive Avia-tion. It’s a very interesting locationfrom a quality perspective, too:we seea lot of scope for product innovationssuch as valet parking.

We’ll have to wait and see how Swiss-port Executive Aviation develops, ofcourse, but the figures so far havebeen encouraging. The customerresponse has been very favourable,too, and has exceeded our expecta-tions. It’s further conformation for usthat Nice is the right location; and wecan really claim to have brought moremovement – and movements – to theairport here!

And how do things look in the cargosector?

We’ve acquired, in two phases, a 75-per-cent holding in Eurohandling.Thiswill give us much more penetrationthroughout the French cargo han-dling market, but especially in theprovinces. We work with other part-ners at our Paris operations.

What effect have the recent develop-ments at the SAirGroup had onSwissport France?

We have to wait and see what theSAirGroup’s new strategy will be.Butfor us it’s always been important to beas independent of that strategy aspossible.We have to focus on buildingon our own strengths.

To give you one example: when Ijoined this organisation, it was earn-ing 82 per cent of its revenue from theSAirGroup.That’s a huge dependency,and thus a huge business risk. We’vebeen making a conscious effort tomake ourselves less dependent on theSAirGroup and any fluctuations it

may go through. And those effortshave had their effect: we should havethe SAirGroup’s share of our totalrevenue down to 65 per cent by theend of the year. And we won’t bestopping there: we want to get thatpercentage down even lower.

But whatever strategy the SAirGroupadopts, Swissport will retain itsFrench activities. And SwissportFrance will continue its development.What we do need to do is be as flexi-ble as possible, to respond to anychanges in the general situation.So allin all, what we’re striving for is maxi-mum independence and the ability torespond flexibly to any new develop-ments. But Swissport will still beSwissport – and we’re here to stay!

What are your biggest priorities interms of your employees?

Well,one thing is abundantly clear:ourstaff are our most valuable asset.AndI’m really very, very impressed by thepeople we have here.It’s our personnel,through their day-to-day work, whocreate the image we enjoy with ourcustomers.And that work is permeat-ed with their professionalism, theirenthusiasm, their flexibility and theirsophisticated sense of quality. All that,together with the friendliness to put asmile on the face of the customer.

When it comes to our personnel, Ioften find myself thinking of some-thing the Reverend Jesse Jacksononce said: “I don’t have the right notto be the best”. That’s somethingwhich is true for all of us at Swissport.

And if we are the best, then no moun-tain can be too high, no valley toodeep and no sea too wide for us totackle. It’s not where we’re comingfrom, it’s where we’re going thatcounts.And it’s up to all our managersto channel this attitude into our dailywork, so that our customers can seeand feel that we don’t just serve themwell; we serve them willingly, too.

Interview: Martin C. GhéczyPhotos: August Kehl


S W I S S P O R T E U R O P E

profitability, too

FA C T S A N D F I G U R E S O N S W I S S P O R T F R A N C E

Station Market share

Nice (NCE) 51%Marseille (MRS) 22%Lyon (LYS) 10%Toulouse (TLS) 15%Montpellier (MPL) 58%Paris (CDG) in preparation

Potential new stations Bordeaux (BOD) and Nantes (NTE)Main customers FU, IW, IJ, SR, SN, LX, BA, LHTotal personnel 650


A P P R E C I AT I O N

AWARD ■ “Global Ground Handling Company of the Year 2001”

Bursting with prideD U A L B E N E F I T

“In investing the prestigious ac-creditation of Global GroundHandling Company of the Year2001 in Swissport, the ITM isputting Swissport forward to itscomprehensive membership asa blueprint for an ideal globalground handling company.

The accreditation has the dualbenefit of combining positiveindustry opinion and member con-fidence in Swissport.”

Paul ConlonBusiness Development Director,ITMIt’s one thing to claim that you’re doing a fine job; it’s another to receive confirmation of this from customers and

independent bodies. That’s why its recent nomination as “Global Ground Handling Company of the Year 2001”

by the Institute of Transport Management has filled Swissport International with such pride. The award is telling

testimony to the group’s constant energies and endeavours in its global ground handling activities.E X U B E R A N C E I S a forgivable sin when there’s good reason for it. And it’s with genuine delight that Swissport

received the “Global Ground Handling Company of the Year 2001” award from the Institute of Transport Management

(ITM) for its exemplary role as a first-class provider of ground handling services worldwide.To earn the distinction, Swissport’s performance has been closely scrutinised over the past two years. So the decision to

present the group with the “Global Ground Handling Company of the Year 2001” accreditation is the result of thorough

research conducted on behalf of the ITM’s Air Transport Committee.Global branding and uniform qualityAnnouncing the award, Kieran Ring, Executive Director of the ITM and Chairman of its Air Transport Committee, said:“With

over 40 years experience in the industry, Swissport is renowned as a leading provider of ground handling services to the air

transport industry. The company operates at over 125 airports in 25 countries and places high standards of excellence on all

aspects of its operations in order to achieve worldwide consistency.”There were other factors that contributed to the ITM’s decision, too. “The ITM is impressed,” Ring added, “by the impor-

tance Swissport places on quality through its ongoing ISO 9002 certification and Total Quality Management, which result in

the seamless integration evident in its operations across the globe.”“Following the acquisition of DynAir in the US,” he continued, “Swissport advanced to become the world’s largest ground

handler and DynAir’s subsequent name change to Swissport stresses the importance placed on global branding and uniform

quality of service worldwide. The acquisition of a significant holding in Miascor Ground Handling of the Philippines extends

Swissport’s activities to the Asia-Pacific region and demonstrates their dedication to giving their customers a truly global

offering.”

Plus10 sealed itThe ITM also praised Swissport’s Plus10 customer services programme, which it felt had given the company a further edge

on its competitors. Plus10 adds value to the overall service provided by Swissport and keeps it ahead of the competition in

this highly competitive industry by offering ten additional values at no additional cost.A further aspect of Swissport operations which appealed to the ITM was the group’s continuing innovations and use of new

media to grow its business. With EASYcontact, Swissport has developed the first and so far only state-of-the-art automatic

proposal platform. EASYcontact is the first component in an e-business system that is designed to expedite contact

management and significantly enhance customer relations. The equally innovative Lost@Found baggage tracing module

within Plus10, meanwhile, allows passengers to access status information on their bags. This service, via the www.mylost-

bag.com platform, can also be set up as a link to customer websites, adding even more value for the customer.Continued commitment What rounded off ITM’s decision was the strategic thinking that Swissport regularly displays. It’s an approach that is

exemplified by the group’s willingness to broaden its horizons by expanding into such areas as security, fuelling and

automated systems. All in all, as the ITM awards committee put it: “In every aspect of their operations Swissport

demonstrate continued commitment to delivering ever-improving levels of customer satisfaction through their innovative

thinking. We are delighted to be presenting this award to a company which strives for excellence in everything they do.”It’s a tribute that would make anyone’s chest swell with pride. So if Swissport seems a little exuberant right now, we hope

you’ll understand.

Swissport’s Operations unit has asimple mission: to ensure thatevery station offers a top-qualityservice product. It’s a task it per-forms in two main ways. First, itensures top quality by moni-toring adherence to the standardsenshrined in our ISO certifica-tion. Second, it encourages theadoption of “best practice”approaches wherever theseare available. Thanks toa newly-developed Internetplatform, the experienceand expertise of over 15000Swissport employees cannow be channelled simplyand swiftly into formu-lating these best practiceguidelines.

S W I S S P O R T M AYB E one of the biggestground handlers, but sizeis no guarantee of suc-cess. The quality of yourservice product dependson your personnel –their experience, theirskills and their exper-tise. But how do youtap all that and translate it into a“best practice” approach?

Third time luckyTo devise Swissport’s best practicetools, the Operations unit looked at anumber of approaches.

The third idea proved the most work-able. Introduced last autumn, it hasachieved good results to date. Thisapproach calls for every subsidiarywithin the Swissport Group toappoint an “Information Manager”.Each Information Manager is thensent a discussion topic by e-mail fromOperations. Once they have received

the topic, the Information Managerscheck to see what knowledge or expe-rience of the issue is available withintheir company. This information isthen e-mailed back to Operations,and to all the other Information Man-agers.

Once this has been done, Operationsmoulds the basic input and any dis-cussion it has generated into a “best

practice” approach. This inturn is for-

mulated asa Recommended HandlingPractice or a Standard SwissportHandling Procedure, which is thenpublished, distributed and imple-mented systemwide. RecommendedHandling Practices are not compul-sory, but are considered the best pro-cedure to adopt as far as Swissport isconcerned;Standard Swissport Hand-ling Procedures must be followed byall Swissport companies.

Hot issuesThe new approach has quickly createda useful discussion forum for various

ground handling issues. The last fewmonths have seen extensive exchangesof ideas, experiences and viewpointson key matters such as dealing withexcessive carry-on baggage or delayannouncements.

The problem of excessive carry-onbaggage is as old as air transport itself.But an airline can only offer its pas-sengers the kind of cabin comfort andsafety they desire if it is supported in

its restriction of carry-on baggageby its handling

agent. Swissport seesitself as an active partner in this vitalconcern,and its Recommended Hand-ling Practice on Carry-on Baggageis specifically designed to help res-olve the problem to everyone’s satis-faction.

As customer complaints reveal, hon-est and timely information is anotheraspect of ground services that is muchappreciated by passengers. Swissportstrives to offer this, too, by imple-menting and consistently following itsStandard Swissport Handling Proce-dure regarding delay announcements.

The sizable increase in baggage irre-gularities over the last few years hasalso spurred Operations into action.The unit has been taking a long, hardlook at the present “lost and found”arrangements,and is currently studyingalternatives to the present proce-dures. A clearer distribution of re-sponsibilities within the local Lost

and Found organisations and the useof new tools such as baggage tag scan-ners should help standardise work-flows and expedite the search for bagsthat go astray.

As these examples show, Swissport’snew Internet-based platform is pro-

viding an excellent forumfor staff to contri-bute their ideas,knowledge and expe-rience of some of thetoughest issues in theground handling world.

Available onlineAll the RecommendedHandling Practices andStandard Swissport Hand-ling Procedures are pub-lished in the SwissportOperations Manual. TheManual is also availableonline, making it even easi-er for employees to consult.The online facility also en-ables Swissport to distributeits best practice guidelinesthroughout its network in amatter of seconds. All in all,Swissport Operations’ bestpractice “e-forum” excellentlycomplements the unit’s ISOmonitoring and implementationactivities, helping it meet its mis-

sion of ensuring that every one of thegroup’s stations offers a top-qualityservice product. And that, of course,is in the interests of everyone con-cerned.


Q U A L I T Y A S S U R A N C E

OPERATIONS ■ An innovative approach to quality assurance

Pooling “best practice”over the Net

Stefan Resele19.03.2001 15:10

To:

Information exchange

cc:

[e-mail to all Information Managers]

bcc:–Subject:

Information exchange amongst Swissport Companies

Topic Nº 4 – Lost & Found Procedures

Dear Information ManagerIn order to improve the service of various lost & found organizations in our network,

the following Standard Swissport Handling Procedure has been worked out:

Stefan Resele

Swissport International AGExecutive VP Operations (BQ)P. O. Box – CH-8058 Zurich-AirportPhone:

+41-1/812 75 93Mobile:

+41-79/200 47 35Telefax:

+41-1 /811 10 01E-Mail:

[email protected]

The new approachhas quickly

created a usefuldiscussion forum

for various groundhandling issues.

“e-forum”: helping swissportmeet its mission of offering a top-

quality service productC O N TA C T

Stefan ReseleSwissport International Ltd.CH-8058 Zurich AirportPhone: +41 1 812 75 93Fax: +41 1 811 10 [email protected]

Manaus

Anchorage

Honolulu

SpokaneSeattlePasco

Reno

Portland

Salt Lake City

Denver

Wichita

Kansas City

San FranciscoSan Jose

Oakland

Lima

São Paulo

ViracoposRio de Janeiro

Salvador

Recife

San Juan

MiamiSanford

Worcester

Boston

WashingtonMiddletown

New York

RichmondNorfolk

CharlotteRaleigh Durham

Rochester

Chicago

Des Moines

Peoria

NashvilleGreenville

St. Louis

GrandRapids

TampaHouston

AustinSan Antonio

Fort MyersBrownsvilleLaredo

El PasoDallas

Jackson

Oklahoma City

Phoenix

Las Vegas

San DiegoLos Angeles

Fortaleza

Newburgh

Columbia

Brasilia

Natal

MexicoCancun

Santo DomingoPuerto Plata Punta Cana

Buenos Aires

Lexington

NewarkDetroit

Atlanta

Congonhas

La Romana

N E T W O R K

Some of the more than 500 customers served by Swissport International around the world

Adria AirwaysAer LingusAero LloydAeroflotAerolineas ArgentinasAeromexicoAir 2000Air AlfaAir AlgerieAir CanadaAir ChinaAir EuropeAir FranceAir IndiaAir Jamaica, Ltd.Air LiberteAir LittoralAir MaltaAir MauritiusAir Tanzania CorporationAJT Air InternationalAlitaliaAll Nippon AirwaysALM Antillean AirlinesAmerica West Airlines, IncAmerican AirlinesAmerican Trans Air, Inc.AOMArkiaAsiana AirlinesAtlas Air, Inc.Austrian AirlinesAviancaAvioimpexBalair /CTABiman Bangladesh AirlinesBritannia Airways LimitedBritish AirwaysBurlington Air Express, Inc.Canadian Airlines InternationalCathay Pacific Airways

China Airlines Ltd.China Eastern AirlinesContinental Airlines Inc.Copa AirlinesCroatia AirlinesCrossairCSA – Czech AirlinesCyprus AirwaysDelta Air LinesDHL Worldwide Express EgyptairEl Al Israel AirlinesEmery Worldwide Airlines, IncEmiratesEthiopian AirlinesEva Airways CorporationEvergreen International

Airlines, IncFederal Express Corp.FinnairGandalf AirlinesGemini Air CargoGhana AirwaysGulf AirHapag-LloydIberiaIcelandairIranairJapan AirlinesJAT Jugoslav AirlinesKLM Royal Dutch AirlinesKorean AirKuwait AirwaysLacsaLauda AirLOT – Polish AirlinesLTULufthansaLuxairMalaysian Airline SystemMalev – Hungarian Airlines

Martinair HollandMEA – Middle East AirlinesMexicana AirlinesMonarch Airlines Ltd.Nippon Cargo AirlinesNorth American Airlines, Inc.Northwest Airlines, Inc.Olympic AirwaysPakistan International AirlinesPolar Air Cargo, IncQantas Airways Ltd.Royal Air MarocRoyal JordanianSabenaSaudi Arabian AirlinesScandinavian Airlines SystemSingapore AirlinesSouth African AirwaysSouthwest Airlines CoSpanairSriLankan Airlines Ltd.SwissairTACA International Airlines, SATAM – Transportes Aereos

Meridionais S/ATAP – Air PortugalTaromThai Airways InternationalTrans World AirlinesTransbrasil Linhas AereasTunisairTurkish AirlinesUnited AirlinesUnited Parcel Service US AirwaysVarig – Brazilian AirlinesVASP – Brazilian AirwaysVirgin Atlantic Airways LtdVolare AirlinesWorld Airways Inc.


Nairobi

Manila

Cebu

Davao

Laoag

Khabarovsk

Johannesburg

Cape Town

Durban

Tel Aviv

London

AmsterdamHamburg

BerlinDusseldorf

MontpellierToulouse

Marseille Nice

FrankfurtStuttgart Munich

ZurichBasel

Lyon Geneva

Cagliari

Trabzon

Adana

Ankara

Corlu IstanbulIzmir

BodrumDalaman

Antalya

Madrid

MalagaPalma de Mallorca

Barcelona

Athens

Paris

Jeddah

Dar es Salaam

Kilimanjaro

Riyadh Dammam

Cologne

Heraklion

Vienna

Seoul

HanoverBremen

recently-opened stations

N E T W O R K

K E Y F I G U R E S 2 0 0 0 / 2 0 0 1

Number of customers over 500Number of employees over 15 000Number of stations over 125Annual revenue USD 683 000 000Passengers handled per year 53 000 000Aircraft handled per year 1 600 000


Latest contracts signedAthens British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, Delta Air Lines, MEA,

Syrian Arab Airlines, Royal Jordanian, Condor, Westair, Aeris, AxonBarcelona Air LittoralBrasilia NATA, GOL Buenos Aires Aero Continente Chile S.A., TransbrasilCancun Aerogaviota, CondorCongonhas GOLDammam Sudan AirwaysDetroit Delta AirlinesFortaleza NATA, Air Europe, Arkia, Airtours, Air2000 Heraklion Axon Airlines, Condor, Westair, AerisJeddah Malaysian Airline SystemJohannesburg Virgin Atlantic, Air FranceLima AerocontinenteLondon Yemen AirlinesLyon GO FLY Ltd.Manaus Lloyd Aereo BolivianoMexico Mas AirNice AOM, Air Europe, CrossairPunta Cana US AirwaysRecife NATA, Air2000 Rio de Janeiro AlitaliaRiyadh Sudan AirwaysSalvador NATA, GOLSanto Domingo TWA, US AirwaysSao Paolo Alitalia, GOLVienna Swissair, Sabena

late summer 2001

Having long been delayed, the issueof the permanent licence was theninexplicably contested and, followingan unsuccessful arbitration attempt,was referred to the highest court fora ruling. The whole process called fora vast amount of energy, nerves andpatience from all the company’s per-sonnel, intensive lobbying and hoursof discussions at every political level:at one point, even President Mandelawas involved!

Still,Armin Unternährer also sees thepositive impact of this ‘baptism offire’. “We were really impressed bythe commitment we got from ourunionised workforce,” he explains.“They launched some amazing pro-tests to fight for the survival of ourcompany and their jobs. Our causewas really taken up by the media, too– radio, television and the press allchronicled our difficulties in obtain-ing our operating licence in greatdetail.” The experience certainlybrought the Swissport South Africateam closer together, too.

Steady progressNot that the time spent waiting for thelicence was wasted in any way.“I can say without any fear of exag-geration that we have transformedSwissport South Africa from a low-quality company to a top-qualitycompany over the last two years,”Armin Unternährer confirms. “Wemay not yet be number one in terms ofour size; but we certainly are in termsof the quality of our service product!”“As the only privately-owned companywith a ramp handling licence,”he con-

It was quite a battle getting itspermanent operating licence; but,since it did so, Swissport SouthAfrica (Pty) Limited has reallytaken off. All the current signs sug-gest that business will soon startbooming, too.

I N FA C T, Swissport South Africa(Pty) Ltd. has only had its permanentoperating licence since January 10.But things have moved at a hecticpace since this long-awaited dayarrived.Air France had been won as acustomer before the month was out;Virgin Atlantic was added in Febru-ary; and Swissair should join them inMay.

“We’ve got eight more customerswho are ready to sign handling agree-ments, too,”adds Armin Unternährer,the company’s outgoing CEO.“Need-less to say, these negotiations all taketime.And any new customer will usu-ally have to complete a notice periodwith their present ground handlerbefore we can take over their hand-ling.So it’s pretty understandable thatwe haven’t won fifty new customerssince we were awarded our licence.But I’m convinced that we’re going tosee a real explosion in our businessvolume between now and the end ofthe year.”

Strong nerves requiredIt’s a far rosier picture than the onethe young company was painting justa few months ago. With the delays inissuing the licence gradually comingto threaten the company’s very sur-vival, Swissport South Africa wentthrough some very lean times indeed.

tinues, “we’ve also made a massiveeffort to enhance our relations withour customers and the various authori-ties. I think that ‘Total Change’ bestsums up those early days.We’ve madetremendous progress on the ramphandling front, too. In fact, we’re cur-rently the only company in SouthAfrica offering a total ground servicespackage that covers all three areas ofpassenger, ramp and cargo handling.The emphasis is still on ramp servicesat present;but we have great plans forour passenger handling as well.”

Christian P. Somogyi

VVooiicceess

Finance & Administration:ready for more businessSwissport South Africa’s Finance andAdmin department employs ninepeople – six in finance and three onthe administrative side.

The accounting system we use is Acc-Pac. The successful installation of theAccPac order entry module anddebtor’s module has significantlyimproved revenue accounting: thetime previously spent on paperworkis now used more effectively in debtcollection. This can be seen in thesubstantial reduction in debtor’s daysfor 2000.

Annual revenue for Swissport SouthAfrica currently runs at ZAR 45 mil-lion. But over the past year ourcompany managed to secure con-tracts with a number of airlines withan estimated total revenue of ZAR 13million per annum. The most notablecontracts currently held are in groundhandling for British Airways, VirginAtlantic and Air France, passengerservices for Cameroon Airlines andcargo handling (in Cape Town) forSingapore Airlines. The gains weremarred only by the loss of one majorcustomer, Lufthansa.

Swissport South Africa has intro-duced an additional excess baggagecollection service, which is offered by

S W I S S P O R T I N T E R N AT I O N A L

SWISSPORT SOUTH AFRICA ■ Believing in the future

A rraaiinnbbooww of powerful impre

C O N TA C T

Fernand StaufferSwissport South Africa (Pty) Ltd.P.O. Box 1620ZA Johannesburg InternationalAirport 1627 South AfricaPhone: +27 11 928 8527Fax: +27 11 928 [email protected]

Karen Clausen, General ManagerOperations: a woman at the wheel.

Vincent Mohube, General ManagerHuman Resources and Training:tomorrow’s team

Sandra Alfaiate, General ManagerFinance and Administration: keepingcosts and cash flow under control is aconstant concern.


S P O T L I G H T

New CEO Fernand Stauffer

THE MAN: As the new CEO ofSwissport South Africa, FernandStauffer is taking over from ArminUnternährer, who will face a newchallenge as CEO of Swissport inPuerto Rico. 45-year-old Staufferis a Swiss national and the fatherof a 17-year-old daughter. Hismother tongue is French, but healso speaks German and Englishplus a little Turkish and Spanish.He considers integrity and beingan industry all-rounder to be hisgreatest strengths, and namesimpatience as his self-confessedweakness.

T H E C A R E E R : Since joiningSwissair back in 1974, FernandStauffer has always aimed for acareer abroad. It’s a career thathas taken him to many farawayplaces. Before joining Swissport in1999, he had already had thechance to get to know SouthAfrica for five years during the1990s. And before assuming hisnew role as CEO of SwissportSouth Africa he was, among otherthings, successful in building asound customer portfolio for Can-cun, Mexico.

THE FUTURE : The new CEOhas a long list of challenges on hisagenda. “We want to enlarge ourcustomer base in all areas: passen-ger handling, cargo handling andwarehousing, and ramp handling,”he explains.“We’ll also be strivingto improve the company’s finan-cial situation. We’ll be focusingfirst on our existing stations inJohannesburg, Cape Town andDurban. Then we’ll look intoopportunities to open other sta-tions in South Africa. Anothergoal is to secure ISO 9002 certifi-cation by the end of the year. Wewill, of course, keep an open mindwith regard to partnerships andcollaborations.” Stauffer stresses afurther point, too: “I consider fullcooperation with and the totalinvolvement of the excellent man-agement team to be of majorimportance.”

the Passenger Services department,over the last couple of months. Thecompany currently provides thisservice to Uganda Airlines and AirTanzania, and is seeking to obtainexcess baggage contracts with El Al,Iberia and Yemen Airlines, too.

While the South African market iscurrently seeing a number of airlineswithdrawing some or all of their oper-ations – Sabena has withdrawn, andAlitalia and TAP Air Portugal haveindicated their intentions to do so –we in the Finance department areconfident that, with the systems nowbeing used and our current staff com-plement, we can handle the expectedincrease in business following receiptof our all-important operating license;and our whole unit is looking forwardto a challenging yet rewarding 2001.

Sandra Alfaiate, General Manager,Finance & Administration

Operations:living up to the challengeTo achieve a highly motivated, per-formance-oriented culture within thecompany, our first task was to changethe hearts and minds of all of our staff,without whose support our overallgoal could never be achieved. Theresult today is a smart-working,customer-, task- and results-orientedteam that is driven to win, and acompany which has become SouthAfrica’s leading provider of qualityground handling services.

The restructuring of our operationsand the introduction of modernmanagement tools and formalisedplanning processes have bred a cultureof responsibility and accountability,allowing each of us to concentrate oneach customer’s particular serviceneeds. Our utilisation of staff re-sources has also risen from 30 percent to 75 to 80 per cent, enabling us

to offer tailor-made packages and ahigh degree of service flexibility.

The outsourcing of our company’smaintenance to a highly-qualified ser-vice provider has helped raise servicereliability, and recent surveys haveshown that ground services equip-ment availability has risen from 28%to a constant 96%.

Swissport South Africa has managedto build up previously-non-existentpartnerships with clients and authori-ties over the past year; and these rela-tionships, which are based on mutualtrust and respect, have helped createand cultivate a powerful corporateimage which proves that Swiss preci-sion and accuracy are not exclusive toSwitzerland itself.

Swissport South Africa earned severalprestigious industry awards duringthe past year. One of these – for thesafest operator on the apron – is a

source of particular pride.We are alsoextremely pleased with the results ofrecent safety audits conducted byclients, and look forward to constantlymonitoring and improving the ser-vices we provide.

In the spirit of crafting partnerships,and indeed friendships, SwissportSouth Africa looks forward to a long,successful and prosperous relation-ship with all its many stakeholders. Infact,with the legal go-ahead in its cor-porate pocket, “the future’s so brightthat we gotta wear shades!”

Karen Clausen, General Manager,Operations

Human Resources:proud family memberWe weren’t too surprised to learn thatSwissport International had beennamed the number-one handling com-pany in the world. After all, SwissportSouth Africa certainly strives to be atleast number one in its own homemarket!

Our HR unit is kept vigilant and busyby the various new labour laws thathave been introduced since the newpolitical dispensation in 1994. One ofthe many things that Swissport SouthAfrica is obliged to do as a companyis train its employees. In fact, we trainand retrain employees not becausethe law obliges us to, but because webelieve that to provide optimum ser-vice delivery, our employees mustalways be equipped with all theknowledge we can give them abouttheir job. This not only enhances ser-vice; it develops the employee as anindividual and makes them moremarketable, too.

Our HR unit is also tasked withensuring that employees with thepotential to “reach for the skies” aregiven the “wings” to do so. Thus, wehave started a management poolproject for which employees are invit-ed to apply, and under which thosewith the potential to become ourfuture managers are assigned men-tors to help them realise their goalwithin the shortest possible time.

We may live in a heterogenous soci-ety, but Swissport South Africa is ahomogeneous family that is proud tooffer quality service to its customers;and we will support each and everyother Swissport family in their effortsto maximise quality service deliveryand realise their potential.

Vincent Mohube, General Manager,Human Resources & Training

S W I S S P O R T I N T E R N AT I O N A L

essssiioonnss


“The future’s sobright that

we gotta wearshades!”

Ernest Eisner, Executive Vice Presi-dent Handling Services for ViennaAirport AG, is a straight talker. Hegave us an insight into the groundhandling situation at Vienna Air-port in the new post-big-bangliberalised environment.

Swissreporter: Mr. Eisner, what im-pact has liberalisation had on yourbusiness?

Ernest Eisner: When liberalisationcame along, we withdrew from pas-senger handling to concentrate on ourcore competencies.We lost a few cus-tomers, like Air France and Alitalia;but we gained British Airways, whichis a very discerning customer, too.Shifts like these are in the nature ofour business. But a lot of our cus-tomers appreciate the length of the

relationship we’ve builtup with them, and

they’re happy to stay with us if wegive them the quality they need.

Actually, we started getting ourselvesin shape before liberalisation arrived.We conducted a thorough study ofour operations, took a long look atkey issues like turnaround times anddeveloped our own quality system.We did all this to prove that we mayhave our price, but we do offer top-quality services.Those services can bequantified, too. To take one example,by scanning all our bags, we have allour data online. So customers cancheck out our performance for them-selves any time they wish. It’s all clearevidence of our two prime priorities –long-lasting partnerships with ourcustomers, and a quality service pro-duct at a reasonable price.

The arrival on the scene of ViennaAirport Services has turned what wasa monopoly into a duopoly. Is thereroom for more players – a third ramplicence, for instance?

Yes, we do have a duopoly here inVienna, but mainly because it’s prettydifficult for two! Even now, the smallerprovider needs a lot of resources and

equipment in proportion tothe services they pro-

vide. I don’t think we’llsee a third operator,for physical reasonsapart from anythingelse: there’s not enoughspace. So I don’t think

we’ll see a thirdramp licence

issued,

even in the longer term. In terms ofmarket share, too, the sums don’t addup. If you want to make it as a groundhandler, you need to have a certainmarket share. So I’d say no: there’s noroom for another ground handler, interms of either the physical facilitiesor the market potential.

At most airports, liberalisation hasbeen followed by a fall in handlingprices of 10 to 15 per cent. How comethat hasn’t happened in Vienna?

The prices have fallen here, thoughnot so dramatically. But here, too, weneed to consider the bigger picture.Prices have gone down in real terms,because, although our salary costshave increased, we’ve kept our hand-ling rates unchanged for the last fewyears. On top of that, we’ve addedextra services to our ground handlingpackage. So in relative terms we’veprobably lowered our prices to thesame degree.The price our customerspay for our services may not be 15 percent lower than it was before liberali-sation; but they are getting 20 to 30per cent more service for their mon-ey,and more quality, too.That’s wherewe see our chance: offering more ser-vice and more quality. We can’t justkeep lowering prices: if we did, we’dend up charging less than our produc-tion costs! We want to survive andthrive by doing things better thananyone else.

The prices for ramp services are threeto four times as high as passengerhandling prices. Is this because liber-alisation hasn’t really made its presen-ce felt in the ramp services market yet?

No, I think there are other reasonsbehind the discrepancy.There are two

big factors in ramp services costs –the cost of the personnel and

the cost of the equipment.Ramp services entail a

lot of movingthings around,

and for thatyou

need people. It depends where you’relocated, but for most service compa-nies,personnel will be the biggest costcomponent. Added to that, most cus-tomers today want to keep turn-around times as short as possible, andthat calls for more manpower andequipment.That all means we need tomake massive investments in our per-formance. And that costs money.

We’re also constantly investing innew equipment, to keep abreast oftechnological developments and pro-vide a maximum of safety and security.We were, for example, one of the firstground handlers to invest in wirelessLAN technology. As a result, we canuse our IT resources wherever we are– to hand-scan baggage, for instance,while maintaining optimum securitystandards.With all this technology,wecan conduct a full passenger baggagecross-check with a transfer time ofjust 25 minutes.

But we also have to remember thatnot all airlines want all these facilities.So we offer a range of services, andthe selection the customer chooses isreflected in their handling fees.

The cost factors you mentioned applyat any airport. So why is Vienna oneof the most expensive airports inEurope, or even in the world?

We must distinguish here betweenVienna Airport and our airport hand-ling. If we’re talking about landing

fees,passenger taxes,


L I B E R A L I S AT I O N

INTERVIEW ■ Ernest Eisner, Executive Vice President Handling Services,

“We got in shape be

infrastructure costs and so on, thenyes, I’d agree: Vienna is in the higherprice segment. But when it comes toground handling charges,we can com-pete with the best. And we can do sobecause – and this could be the bestthing about the EU liberalisationguidelines – we started four or fiveyears ago to make substantial changesto the way we conducted our business.

I must stress again here that wehaven’t raised our prices for the lastfive years.That’s quite an achievementwhen you consider we’re based in acountry which has sizable social securi-ty costs,and where personnel costs areincreasing at about seven per cent ayear – a trend over which we have zeroinfluence or control – through collec-tive working agreements, changes tothe law and rising social security con-tributions. Yet despite all these deve-lopments, we’ve managed to identifyand exploit potential for improve-ments in areas such as our technologyand training.

There’s something else we need tomention here, too. A full 80 per centof our loyal and highly motivatedstaff are drawn from the airportregion. That makes us an importantlocal employer; and that gives us a lotof goodwill on issues such as the air-port’s further expansion.We try to seethe broader picture, you see; and westrive to cultivate genuine partner-ships with all the parties involved.

Coming back to pricing, Vienna Air-port Services offer prices that are20 per cent below yours. How do yourespond to that?

VAS needs the market share and isundercutting us, if that’s really truewith the 20 per cent. If we followedsuit, we’d find ourselves in a doublebind: first, there’s no way we couldmake that a profitable operation; andsecond, our customers would feelwe’d been overcharging them foryears, which we haven’t! As I saidbefore, it’s continuity and long-termpartnerships that interest us: priceisn’t everything. A good shopper willalways ask: what am I paying andwhat am I getting? And I think someairlines that have only focused onprice have ended up regretting it. Ican assure you that we won’t be goinginto the ‘price dumping’ business.There’s no point ruining a market by

offering bargain-basement prices.Gaining market share whatever thecost is a very short-term strategy.That’s not to say that we don’t wel-come liberalisation.But liberalisationwas never intended to destroy thehealth of the market and its players.We make massive efforts for all ourcustomers, and we go to our limits tomeet their needs.We may lose one ortwo, but we’ll win one or two, too.That’s the way it is. But even a VAScan’t sell its products at less than costfor long.

As a local provider, with no otheroperations, we can’t use economies ofscale either to lower our rates. Butthat’s just one more reason we needto be better than the rest. In that

sense, we’re pleased to have a partnerlike Swissport: the international massthey provide makes quite a combina-tion with our local strength. In asense, our customers get the best ofboth worlds, and all at a reasonableprice.And we find they’re prepared topay that little bit more for a qualityground service product.

It’s been said that the quality of thepassenger handling offered by AustrianAirlines has declined a little lately.Any views here?

I’m not the person to pass verdict onthat one! What I would say, on a gen-eral note, is that it’s very dangerous tocut costs in the wrong places – like notpaying enough attention to the quali-ty of your staff. You’ll only have truequality if you have loyalty from bothsides – from the company to its per-sonnel and from the personnel to thecompany. If you lower your prices,you have to make savings some-where: on your equipment or, evenworse, on your personnel. It’s a crudepolicy, and it just doesn’t work.

As one of Vienna’s duopolists, areyou looking to streamline yourcustomer portfolio?

Being able to choose your customersis certainly a big benefit of liberalisa-tion.And the more exotic carriers arehaving a harder time of it now. Why,for instance, should we acquireexpensive special equipment if weknow it won’t pay for itself? As the

airport’s sole handler, we had toaccept every airline that wanted ourservices. But in the new liberalisedenvironment, it’s one of the first rulesof business to focus on those cus-tomers that promise you betterreturns. In a way, of course, this is evi-dence that the free market is working,and liberalisation is having its effect.But there will be losers on the pricingfront, too – special flights with specialcargo, for instance, which usuallywant to be handled at less sociablehours.But maybe someone who doesn’tfit into our portfolio will fit intoVAS’s, so it all equals out in the end.

Interview: Martin C. Ghéczy


L I B E R A L I S AT I O N

, Vienna Airport AG

fore liberalisation began.”

C O N TA C T

Renate AdelmannGeneral ManagerSwissport Austria GmbHOffice 262 cA-1300 Vienna AirportPhone:+43 1 7007 35505Fax: +43 1 7007 [email protected]

“ L I K E B E I N G O N S TA G E ”

Swissport has officially been pro-viding the full range of passengerhandling services at Vienna Air-port since March 25. “It was nonetoo easy recruiting the staff weneeded to start our new operati-ons – the job market here is reallypretty dry,” recalls Renate Adel-mann, General Manager Swiss-port Austria GmbH. “But wemanaged to get the team of 45employees that we felt we neededto embark on our activities. Still,we hope to raise that number toaround 70 before too long.”

Recruiting good staff is one thing;training them and immersing themin the Swissport philosophy is ano-ther.“I tell all our new people thatwe want to be ‘best of class’,”Adelmann continues. “After all,average performance is prettyeasy to find. That’s why we attachso much value to our openness,our innovation and our internatio-nal perspective.Which includes, ofcourse, an appealing corporateimage, a pronounced ability tolisten to our customers, and soundcore values like a friendly andpartnerly approach.”

“But you’ll only have a harmo-nious and committed team if youencourage a lot of exchange bet-ween team members and practisea consistent open-door policy,”Adelmann points out. “That’ssomething our people found outfor themselves on their very firstday – as ‘newcomers’ on the scene,everyone was watching us intently.It was like being on stage!”

And how has she found workingwith the Vienna Airport company?“The airport’s really growing, andwe have to have good relationsbetween the various airport part-ners.We’ve drawn up a memoran-dum of understanding for ourwork with the airport company. Sowe can look forward to a goodworking relationship there. Andthe collaboration between theramp and the passenger units hasworked seamlessly, too.”

“Gaining market sharewhatever the cost is

a very short-term strategy.”

■ S W I S S P O R T Z U R I C H

LANded at Zurich AirportThe changeover from Redcaps toCoordinators at Zurich Airport, ismaking rapid progress. Swissport hassteadily invested in wireless local areanetwork (W-LAN) communicationssince last summer, and has started toequip its Coordinators with W-LANvehicles.

These small vehicles are ideal forworking on open stands away fromthe terminals: instead of shuttlingbetween aircraft and office, theCoordinator can stay in the vehicleright next to the aircraft to deal withany problems that arise. The vehiclesare equipped with PC, printer, radioand mobile phone and access to allthe necessary systems such as DCS,PARS, Carido and the intranet.

The 60 antennas of the wireless localarea network cover the whole ZurichAirport area. With a range of 50 to400 metres, they guarantee fast andexcellent data transmissions. Airportoperations should have switchedcompletely to Coordinators by mid-2002.

Additional traffic volumes, how-ever, are creating a need for morepersonnel. Thus, the 63 Redcaps of

spring 2000 will become 83 Coordina-tors by summer 2001. At the sametime, the use of W-LAN technologysubstantially increases efficiency andthe automation of manual processes.

As an innovative ground handler,Swissport will be extending the use ofW-LAN to other parts of its network.This move also reflects the overalltrend towards e-business and its wire-less components.

Roland Breitler

■ L I M A

Main deck loader successfully transferredSwissport Lima has used the syner-gies of the Swissport network totransfer a main deck loader fromMiami in excellent shape and fullworking order. This was one of theunit’s main tasks for 2001, after cargocarrier Cielos del Peru increasedits DC-10 widebody operations inNovember 2000.

Serlipsa Swissport is the main groundhandler at Lima’s Jorge ChavezAirport today. The company handlesthe major airlines arriving in Lima:14 for cargo handling (56%) and ten for airside services (40%), which

are shared between four serviceproviders. All this provides amplegrounds for pride. And the recenttransfer of the main deck loader ishelping to keep service at a very highlevel.

Ronaldo Schwarz

■ M U N I C H A I R P O R T

Aerogate passes qualitytest with flying coloursSwissport partner Aerogate scoredsome excellent results for its Munichoperations in a quality assessment con-ducted recently by the QualiflyerGroup.The survey involved the assess-ment of 44 stations by an independenttester, focusing on issues such as bag-gage delivery times, check-in queuesand the friendliness and professional-ism of staff.

While the assessment’s standardswere high,Aerogate recorded almost100-per-cent scores in many areas.“The emphasis we put in our trainingon a friendly and helpful approachreally paid off,” says Roger Scheifele,the unit’s General Manager.

Not that Aerogate will be resting on itslaurels. The unit is working on furtherimprovements to its services, togetherwith the Qualiflyer Group. Regularchecks are also being conducted toensure that the unit maintains the highhandling standards it has itself set.

Nicole Drsha

G R E E C E

Swissport present atAthens’ new Spata AirportAthens has just gained a new airportin Spata (in its Attica district); and

Swissport Hellas is a key part of thischallenging new operation. Accord-ing to the official announcement, theopening was scheduled for March 28.Swissport Hellas is well equipped forits new tasks; it has just obtained ISO9002 certification, a seal of approvalfor the quality of the services it pro-vides.

Swissport Hellas Cargo will also start operations at Spata in a 4000-square-metre dedicated cargo ware-house. Combining the forces andresources of Swissport and FreightPlus in this project should producestrong results from the start.

Swissport Hellas and Swissport HellasCargo are both headed by CEO/General Manager Bernard Karrer andOperations Manager Klaus Schul. Thetwo-man team are also in charge ofSwissport Hellas Sud, which has nowobtained a full licence to performground handling at Heraklion (Crete)in a joint venture with Aviareps startingin summer 2001.

With a good basis of six customer air-lines at Athens’ Hellinikon Airportand work already under way onfurther expanding its portfolio, thecommercial outlook for SwissportHellas is very bright – even though


S W I S S P O R T W O R L D W I D E

NNeewwss aanndd vviieewwss ffrroommaallll oovveerr tthhee wwoorrlldd

Klaus Schul and Bernard Karrer.

Well received: the main deck loader.W-LAN in action.

the operations team is currentlyhaving to split itself between dailyoperations on the one hand andcoordinating the move on the other.Still, with the zeal, the dedication andthe continuous support of the entirestaff under the guidance of themanagement, the prospects for firmly establishing the company inthe region look very promisingindeed.

Bernard Karrer

■ AMSTERDAM SCHIPHOL

Company Safety Award 2000Dutchport, our Swissport subsidiaryat Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport,haswon the airport’s “Company SafetyAward for 2000”. In bestowing thedistinction, the Schiphol AirportAuthority (AAS) acknowledged allthe safety and security measures thatDutchport has implemented in itsoperations as well as its contribution

to the various airport safety organisa-tions.

Dutchport is very satisfied with thisrecognition, following on as it doesfrom the company’s ISO 9002 certifi-cation in February 2000. The awardencourages Dutchport to continue itsefforts to provide ground handlingservices that are as safe and efficientas possible;and it should also help thecompany add to its growing portfolioof customer airlines.

“Dutchport Amsterdam emerged asthe winner of the Company SafetyAward 2000 after beating their com-petitors in Amsterdam in all aspects,”said the AAS. The distinction alsooffers further proof that Swissport’ssafety and quality philosophy is righton the mark.

Othmar Widmer

■ U S A

Swissport now Delta’s preferred handlerin Detroit, tooSwissport USA opened its first newlocation of 2001 at Detroit Metropol-itan Airport in Michigan on January15.The new business, providing ramp,

cabin cleaning,ground services equip-ment maintenance and janitorial ser-vices for Delta Air Lines operations,is the second location awarded toSwissport USA by Delta within thelast three months and marks anotherbig step towards solidifying Swissportas a preferred Delta vendor.

Delta operates 11 daily flights toDetroit – two Boeing 767s, two 757s,two 737s and five MD-88s. TheDetroit station will be managed bySwissport Station Manager RobertGuerrero, a five-year Delta Detroitveteran, supported by 57 Swissportemployees. The station will report toSoutheast Regional Vice PresidentFrank Mena, who also oversees theLexington, Kentucky station whereSwissport USA began handling Deltaflights last summer.

Delta Station Manager Ginny Elliottand her staff were very supportiveand appreciative of the start-up team,and were very impressed with thechanges observed at the station


S W I S S P O R T W O R L D W I D E

News Ticker✈

during the start-up and the first weekof operation.

All in all, the whole Swissport team isready to deliver an excellent perfor-mance and high-quality services forcurrent and future customers.

Meg Smith

■ A U S T R I A

Vienna opensIt was with great enthusiasm that Swiss-port Austria GmbH officially started itsoperations at Vienna Airport on March25, offering a comprehensive rangeof passenger-related services. The unitwill initially be serving Swissair andSabena, though other important carri-ers have also shown a keen interest injoining.General Manager Renate Adel-mann will be happy to provide pricingdetails and any other information.

A memorandum of understanding hasalso been drawn up with FlughafenWien AG to ensure attractive rampservices rates for customers.Interestedparties should contact Mr. Eisner orMr. Polster of Flughafen Wien AGdirectly for more details.

Renate Adelmann

And the winners are … Dutchport! Alexandra Klempt, very first employee of Swissport Austria.

✈ A S I AS E O U LSwissport will now commence its ground handling activities at

Seoul’s new Inchon International Airport late summer, strengthening itsposition in the Asian market.

✈ E U R O P E AT H E N S / H E R A K L I O NSwissport Hellas SA is now also active in Heraklion, offering the

full range of ground handling services.

B R E M E N / H A N O V E RSwissport Germany was set to open new handling units in

Hanover and Bremen on April 1, giving it the most extensive stationnetwork in Germany. Launching customers are Eurowings and KLM.

S T U T T G A R TSwissport has merged its passenger handling activities with

Stuttgart Airport Ltd. to create “Aerogate Stuttgart GmbH” with a staffof around 210. The move is part of the overall strategy of teaming up withstrong partners to provide the full range of ground services, including ramphandling.

✈ S O U T H A M E R I C A S A O PA U L OSwissport started operations at Brazil's busiest airport, Sao Paulo

Congonhas on January 15. In a record lead time of only 10 days, SwissportBrazil managed to provide full handling for its launching cutomer GOL.

✈ AWA R D SS O U T H A F R I C ASwissport was named “Safest and most disciplined airside operator”

at the annual year-end function of the Airport Company of South Africa.The award, one of five, is based on an independent survey conducted by arenowned South African consulting company.

M A N I L AAsiana Airlines has voted Swissport Manila “Best station in

Asiana’s network for the year 2000”.The distinction is the result of surveysconducted regularly aboard Asiana’s flights.

B A S E LSwissport Basel AG has received the “Award of Excellence” from

Korean Air Cargo in recognition of its contribution towards freighterhandling services. The excellent warehouse and ramp handling serviceswere rewarded for the second year in a row.

✈ I S O 9 0 0 2 C E R T I F I C AT I O N SN I C ENice has become the 36th Swissport station to become ISO 9002-

certificated.

AT H E N SSwissport Hellas in Athens has also been ISO 9002-certificated: the

37th station in the Swissport network and the first in the new millennium!

✈ P R E V I E WS PA I NIn view of its continued expansion, Swissport Spain is now aiming

to obtain ISO 9002 certification, which it hopes to achieve by July.To support these endeavours, the unit has made quality one of its mainfocuses for 2001.

Swissport is definitely “on themove”. It’s a theme that will soonbe communicated in a new andcolourful advertising campaignwith a strong visual impact.

S W I S S P O R T I N T E R N A -T I O N A L will be radically changingits public communications in thecourse of this year.The shift has beenprompted by the direction the groupis currently moving in and the suc-cesses it has enjoyed in the recentpast. The new campaign, which willcentre on the theme of “Swissport onthe move”, will set out to communi-cate the strengths, flexibility andadaptability of our globally-activeground handling group.

A two-track approach Working with the Günter & Kusteragency, Swissport has devised a newtwin-track ad campaign as part ofits overall strategy concept for 2001.The first track will set out to commu-


S P R E A D I N G T H E M E S S A G E

COMMUNICATION ■ New ad campaign launched

A fresh windfor the Swissport brand

QualReport. Swissport’s job vacancyads will also be adapted to the newcorporate look. The ads and allfollow-up printed matter shouldmake quite an impact through theirstrong colours and visual compo-

nents, which are all designed toconvey the message that Swissport is“on the move” and well on the way tofurther business success.

Pit Günter

nicate the Swissport image using realsuccess stories. The second track,meanwhile, will be used specificallyto communicate individual PLUS10activities such as PLUS/Ground-Speed, PLUS/BonusPlan and PLUS/

Swissport in Switzerland

H E A D O F F I C ESwissport International Ltd., Joseph In Albon,President & CEO, P.O. Box, 8058 Zurich Airport,Switzerland, [email protected],tel. +41 1 812 27 79, fax +41 1 811 10 01

Swissport International Ltd., Stephan Beerli,Executive Vice President Marketing & Sales,P.O. Box, 8058 Zurich Airport, Switzerland,[email protected],tel. +41 1 812 49 50, fax +41 1 811 10 01

Swissport International Ltd.,Andreas Bühlmann,Executive Vice President Finance,P.O. Box, 8058 Zurich Airport, Switzerland,[email protected],tel. +41 1 812 42 55, fax +41 1 811 10 01

Swissport International Ltd., Stefan Resele,Executive Vice President Operations,P.O. Box, 8058 Zurich Airport, Switzerland,[email protected],tel. +41 1 812 75 93, fax +41 1 811 10 01

Swissport International Ltd., Peter Sturzenegger,Vice President Global Supply Management,P.O. Box, 8058 Zurich Airport,Switzerland, [email protected],tel. +41 1 812 01 89, fax +41 1 811 10 02

Swissport International Ltd., Urs von Euw,Chief Information Officer IT Management,P.O. Box, 8058 Zurich Airport, Switzerland,[email protected],tel. +41 1 812 43 94, fax +41 1 811 10 02

Swissport International Ltd., Peter Graf,Chief Personnel Officer Human Resources,P.O. Box, 8058 Zurich Airport, Switzerland,[email protected],tel. +41 1 812 87 27, fax +41 1 811 10 02

Swissport International Ltd. Jean-Didier SaviozExecutive Vice President, Division Europe/Middle East, Chemin de Maréchaux, 37,300 Limal, Belgium, [email protected],tel.+4179 255 32 17, fax+4132 10 40 29 80

S W I T Z E R L A N DSwissport Basel AG, Georges Peter,President & CEO, P.O. Box, 4030 Basle Airport,Switzerland, [email protected],tel. +41 61 3252300, fax +41 61 325 23 07

Swissport Genève SA, Ernest Hochuli, President& CEO, P.O. Box 776, 1215 Geneva Airport,Switzerland, [email protected],tel. +41 2279930 10, fax +41 22 799 31 67

Swissport Zürich AG, Willy Hallauer,President & CEO, P.O. Box, 8058 Zurich Airport,Switzerland, [email protected],tel. +41 1 812 61 70, fax +41 1 812 91 95

Swissport aroundthe world

A R G E N T I N ASwissport Argentina S.A.Hugo Schreier, CEO, Intl. Airport Ezeiza,Ministro Pistarini, 1802 Ezeiza, Buenos Aires,Argentina, [email protected],tel. +54 11 5480 4433, fax +54 11 5480 4431

A U S T R I ASwissport Austria GmbH, Renate Adelmann,General Manager, Office 262c,1300 Vienna, Austria, [email protected],tel. +43 1 7007 35505, fax +43 1 7007 35504

B R A Z I LSwissport Brasil Ltda., Dieter Altenburger,President & CEO, Av. Vinte de Janeiro s/n,Via de Servico – Rua T/103,Ilha do Governador, RJ 21941-570,Rio de Janeiro, Brazil,[email protected],tel. +55 21 3398 59 34, fax +55 21 3398 59 32

D O M I N I C A N R E P U B L I CSwissport Dominicana, Omar J. Azar, CEO,Avenida Independencia 1811 Santo Domingo,Dominican Republic, [email protected],tel. +1 809 508 2277, fax +1 809 508 3233

F R A N C ESwissport France, Jan Tindemans,President & CEO, Immeuble Communica,455, Promenade des Anglais,06299 Nice Cedex 3, France,[email protected],tel. +33 4 92 29 44 52, fax +33 4 92 29 44 51

G E R M A N YSwissport Deutschland GmbH, Thomas Neff,President & CEO, P.O. Box 231914,85328 Munich-Airport, Germany,[email protected],tel. +49 89 97811230, fax +49 89 97811236

Aerogate München GmbH,Roger Scheifele, President & CEO,P.O. Box 231533, 85324 Munich Airport,Germany,roger.scheifele@ mucair.munich-airport.de,tel. +49 89 9759 2300, fax +49 89 9759 2006

G R E E C ESwissport Hellas S.A. BernardKarrer, General Manager,Athens International Airport, East Terminal,16603 Hellinikon Athens, Greece,[email protected],tel. +30 1 3370 610, fax +30 1 9622 525

I S R A E LQ.A.S. – Quality Airport Services, Yossi Raviv,President & CEO, P.O. Box 136,Ben Gurion International Airport 70100, Israel,[email protected],tel. +972 3 972 77 77, fax +972 3 972 77 72

I TA LYSogaerDyn, Giorgio Orru, General Director,Aeroporto di Cagliari Elmas, 09030 Elmas, Italy,[email protected],tel. +39 070 212 076, fax +39 070 212 597

K E N YASwissport Kenya, Dirk Olaf Everts, CEO,Jomo Kenyatta Intl. Airport/Unit 2,P.O. Box 44549, Nairobi, Kenya,[email protected],tel. +254 282 20 20, fax +254 2 82 23 29

M E X I C OSwissport de México S.A. de C.V.,Luiz Carlos Leite, CEO,Quetzalcoatl 113, 3er Piso,Col. Penon de los Banos, 15520,Mexico D.F., Mexico,[email protected],tel. +52 5 786 16 02, fax +52 5 786 16 05

T H E N E T H E R L A N D SDutchport vof, Othmar Widmer,President & CEO, WTC – Schiphol Boulevard 181,1118 BG Schiphol Airport, The Netherlands,[email protected],tel. +31 20 40 59 400, fax +31 20 40 59 430

P E R USerlipsa, Alfonso Garcia-Miro,Executive Director, Av. Elmer Faucett 4800Callao, Lima, Peru,[email protected],tel. +511 484 01 11, fax +511 574 23 00

T H E P H I L I P P I N E SMiascor, Juan C. Paraiso III, President & CEO,Citadel Holdings, Inc., 4/F, SGV II Bldg. 6758Ayala Avenue, Makati City,The Philippines, [email protected],tel. +63 2 851 96 47, fax +63 2 851 96 80

P U E R T O R I C OSwissport Puerto Rico Inc., Armin Unternährer,CEO, 150 Carr.Sector Central, Suite 14 /L.M.M. Intl. Airport, 00979 Carolina Puerto Rico,[email protected],tel. +1 787 791 48 28, fax +1 787 791 30 95

R U S S I AKhabarovsk Ground Services, Inc.,Robert Erkens, Vice President,Khabarovsk Airport, International Terminal Room203, Khabarovsk, Russia,tel. +7 4212 37 88 15, fax +7 4212 64 90 28

S A U D I A R A B I ANFS – National Flight Services,Claude Badan, General Manager,P.O. Box 52025, King Abdul Aziz Intl. Airport,21536 Jeddah, Saudi Arabia,[email protected],tel. +966 2 685 05 54, fax +966 2 685 05 59

S O U T H A F R I C ASwissport South Africa (Pty) Ltd.,Fernand Stauffer, CEO,P.O. Box 111, Johannesburg Intl. Airport 1627,South Africa, [email protected],tel. +27 11 928 85 27, fax +27 11 928 85 47

S PA I NSwissport Spain S.A., Espana, Daniel Gut,President & CEO, C/Gran Via, 71-3a dcha.,28013 Madrid, Spain,[email protected],tel. +34 91 548 76 31/32, fax +34 91 541 59 55

TA N Z A N I ADAHACO, Gaudence K. Temu, GeneralManager, P.O. Box 18043,Dar es Salaam Intl. Airport, Tanzania,[email protected]. +255 22 2844 610/14, fax +255 22 2844 343

T U R K E YHAVAS, Hans-Rudolf Moser,General Manager, Prof. Nurettin Öktem Sk.No. 2, 80260 Sisli-Istanbul, Turkey,[email protected],tel. +90 212 233 24 84, fax +90 212 233 38 53

U N I T E D K I N G D O MSwissport U.K. Ltd., Michael J. Maguire, CEO,Room 2411/Terminal 2, HeathrowAirport, TW61HG, Hounslow, Middlesex, UK,[email protected],tel. +44 20 8607 5550, fax +44 20 8754 81 11

U S ASwissport North America, Erich Bodenmann,President & CEO,45025 Aviation Drive, Dulles VA 20166, USA,[email protected],tel. +1 703 742 43 01, fax +1 703 742 43 21

Swissport Fueling, Thomas F. Comeau,President, 45025 Aviation Drive, Suite 350,Dulles VA 20166-7557, USA,[email protected],tel. +1 703 742 4392, fax +1 703 742 4388

Swissport CFE, John Wilson,President, 4560 South Boulevard, Suite 202,Virginia Beach VA 23452, USA,[email protected],tel. +1 757 490 24 65, fax +1 757 490 2543

Hallmark Aviation Services, Philipp Huber,President, 6033 W. Century Blvd., Suite 890,Los Angeles CA 90045, USA,[email protected],tel. +1 310 215 0701 fax +1 310 215 9073


C O N TA C T S

I M P R E S S U M

Published by:Swissport International Ltd. –an SAirServices company

Publisher:Stephan Beerli, Executive VicePresident Marketing & Sales,Swissport International [email protected]

Editor-in-chief:Martin C. GhéczyflowRelations, 6301 ZugPhone: +41-41-768 21 82Fax: +41-41-768 21 [email protected]

Swissport coordinator:Nicole [email protected]

Contributors to this issue:Sandra AlfaiateStephan BeerliPeter BeutlerRoland BreitlerKaren ClausenPaul ConlonNicole DrshaUrs von EuwPierre GuggenheimPit GünterBernard KarrerVincent MohubeAndreas MüllerJean-Luc PayotStefan ReseleRonaldo SchwarzMeg SmithChristian P. SomogyiFernand StaufferJan TindemansAxel TuelmannArmin UnternährerOthmar Widmer

Translations:Paul Day, SAirGroup Translations

Layout and printing:DAZ, Druckerei Albisrieden Zurich

Subscriptions:For a free subscription, please sendyour full name and address to theSwissreporter Information Desk.

Changes of address:Please send details of any change ofaddress (by returning your mailinglabel with the changes clearly indi-cated) and any other correspon-dence regarding subscriptions to theSwissreporter Information Desk.

Printed in SwitzerlandCirculation 14 500

© 2001 Swissport InternationalLtd., Zurich Airport, Switzerland

Swissreporter Information Desk:Phone: +41 1 812 49 54Fax: +41 1 811 10 [email protected]

www.swissport.com

Combine leadership in numbers with leadership in quality and you’ve got a winning team.

The Air Transport Committee of the Institute of TransportManagement invested two years of research to identify the world’s best ground handler. Guess who they picked. You can pick us, too – in two minutes. By contacting Nicole Schneider.Phone: +41 1 812 4954, Fax: +41 1 811 1001, [email protected],www.swissport.com

* “Global Ground Handling Company of the Year 2001”Accredited by the ITM Air Transport Committee

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