Summary: Erik Venter is CEO of South Africa-based Comair. Mr Venter speaks with us about his airline and the challenges it faces, as well as the opportunities, of operating in South Africa. Comair has been operating profitably for over 60 years. But it gets tougher as the state-owned competition continues to lose money and has a seemingly bottomless taxpayer funded bank account. Meanwhile a plucky team at Comair runs the highest level domestic service as a British Airways franchise while at the same time operating its own LCC (Kulula). Looking ahead Comair must seek other markets given the limited size of the South African travel market. Mr Venter drops hints at an Africa hub to the north which could ultimately allow its 737-800NGs to serve the EU.
