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Transcript of SWISS AIR
Failure of SWISSAIR
Learning From Corporate Failures
Final Project Report
Submitted to
Prof. P.D. Jose
Submitted by
ABHILASH KUMAR SETHI (1111323)
RACHANA DONGRE (1111366)
KUNDAN MAL VERMA (1111350)
DANIEL BOCHNITSCHEK (11E6102)
LEELA BHARATH G (1011032)
Dated: 16 January 2013
CONTENTS
Case Summary........................................................................................................................................................................... 2
Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................................... 3
Swissair (SAirGroup): Company Profile ......................................................................................................................... 3
Chronological Overview........................................................................................................................................................ 5
Evaluation: Reasons of Failure ........................................................................................................................................... 8
Flawed Strategy ................................................................................................................................................................... 8
Conflict Swissair vs. Crossair ......................................................................................................................................... 8
Influence of Publicity and Media .................................................................................................................................. 9
Governance and Personalities ..................................................................................................................................... 10
Bad Execution ..................................................................................................................................................................... 10
Financial Analysis .................................................................................................................................................................. 11
Takeaways and Conclusions ............................................................................................................................................. 12
Appendix ................................................................................................................................................................................... 13
References ................................................................................................................................................................................ 14
Table of Figures:
Table 1: Swissair growth at a glance (1931-2000).................................................................................................... 4 Table 2: Choronology of events ......................................................................................................................................... 7 Table 3: Financials for five years .................................................................................................................................... 11 Table 4: Breakdown of EBIT by business unit ........................................................................................................... 11 Table 5: Sairgroup company structure ......................................................................................................................... 13 Table 6: Swissair's equity stakes in other airlines ................................................................................................... 13
CASE SUMMARY
The failure of Swissair, one of the most renowned national airlines worldwide, was the inevitable
result of an overoptimistic alliance strategy which was executed by a management that was
incapable to realize the point when it was necessary to switch course. This mismanagement over
years combined with the external shock of the 9-11 terror attacks finally led to the grounding of
the entire Swissair fleet in November 2011.
The small Swiss national airline refused to join the large airline alliances which formed in the
industry in the early 1990s as a junior partner and tried to build an alternative model by acquiring
small local airlines across Europe and companies in related business fields such as hospitality
and catering. Even as it became clear that none of the expected network effects became reality
the company stuck to the course. Further, it was not able to effectively coordinate its own
operations with those of Crossair, its regional subsidiary.
Weak governance structures and high turnover on top management level were compounded by a
strong public discussion about the strategic future of the national carrier. Media played a major
role by favoring individual executives and their course and thus making them untouchable for the
supervisory board. Finally the involvement of the Swiss state made decision making from a pure
business perspective more complicated.
INTRODUCTION
2nd October, 2001, a very strange incident happened in the global airline industry. The entire
Swissair fleet was grounded due to lack of liquidity with its parent company, the SAirGroup to
pay to the fuel suppliers. Subsequently, a couple of days later, Swissair along with some of its
subsidiaries filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy seeking protection from their creditors. A month
later, Belgium’s Sabena also has to declare bankruptcy in which SAirGroup had 49.5% stake. To
prevent the permanent closure of the airlines, to prevent the loss of the valuable slots and gates at
Swissair’s Zurich hub and other destinations, to reallocate jobs and assets to a new national
airlines and to keep the connection lines open to and from Switzerland, the Switzerland
government and two of the largest banks of Switzerland, UBS and Credit Suisse had pumped in
around 4.25 billion Swiss Francs(CHF) (600 CHF per person in Switzerland) to replace
SAirGroup with SWISS, country’s new national carrier. SWISS was developed around the most
commercially profitable wing of Swissair and the largest regional airline of Europe, the Crossair.
It began its operations on 31st March 2002.
The Swissair collapse is an exemplar in many ways. It was the very first European flagship
airline to get grounded. More importantly, although the depreciating financials of the company
made its decline pretty obvious, but the speed at which it was grounded was exceptional. For
many decades, before the early 1990s, Swissair had boasted to have one the industry’s strongest
financials due to which the company has earned the reputation and nick name of “Flying Bank”
internationally. However, before its collapse, SAirGroup has completely lost its equity count and
its equity ratio was plummeted to 2.55% in August 2001. In the last financial year of its
existence ending on December 2000, SAirGroup has increased their liabilities because of
incessant borrowing by 40% to 18.86 billion CHF as compared to the previous year and
registered negative PBIT for the first time in their career of the order of 2.59 billion CHF.
Through this paper we would like to elicit the various reasons that had led to the failure of such a
giant organization such as incompetence of both the top management and board which has led
to faulty group’s alliance strategy and internal coordination failures along with various external
factors.
SWISSAIR (SAIRGROUP): COMPANY PROFILE
Schweizerische Luftverkehrs AG, or more famously known as Swissair was formed on 26th
March 1931, from the merger of Zurich based Ad Astra Aero AG and Basler Luftverkehr
(Balair). The company since its formation has won many accolades including the Best Airlines
award in all decades to come due to its high quality strategy stressing on safety, reliability,
passenger comfort and punctuality. Swissair was also considered to be a trendsetter in many
fields of European aviation which included introduction of high speed Lockheed Orion aircrafts
in 1932 and many other aircraft carriers in later years as well like Boeing 747-300 etc. It was
also the first airline in Europe to employ air hostesses on its passenger flights in 1934. Swissair
was considered analogous to premium comfort and pride by its passengers and a brand of
Switzerland. After World War II, Swissair has adopted the path of fast growth and had become
one of the world’s major international airlines both in terms number of passengers carried and
passenger miles available. From its formation till its grounding in 2001, the airline has firmly
secured the rank of 20 among all airlines globally. But the high focus on quality and lack of
competition has given rise to the problem of more manpower, who are highly paid for their work
at Swissair. Manpower costs, at a time reached a peak of 39% of the total operating cost of the
company, which has increased the breakeven load factor for the company.
1931 1946 1970 2000
Size of Fleet 13 16 35 161
Number of
Employees 64 789 13280 71900
Number of
Revenue
Passengers
10282 62378 3.9 million 19.2 million
Number of cities
covered 20 15 75 218
Break Even
Load Factor - - 49% 75%
TABLE 1: SWISSAIR GROWTH AT A GLANCE (1931-2000)
Until early 1990s, Swissair was very risk averse as far as the financials were concerned which
provided Swissair with one of the strongest balance sheets in the industry and an excellent credit
rating. Two factors were mainly responsible for this, one being the company policy of having a
maximum 1.2:1 debt to equity ratio. But Swissair has always maintained a better figure than this
and only once in all its year of operation has it reached close to the figure of 1.2:1. Secondly, a
very conservative depreciation policy helped the company generate a healthy cash flow and
reserves.
However after the formation of European Union, where 50.3% population of Switzerland vetoed
against joining the union, the entire company structure changed for Swissair. Swissair has taken
many steps to maintain its ranking in the European aviation industry. This included diverging
from its core competency and investing into non-aviation activities like maintenance and repair,
ground handling, catering, aircraft leasing, duty-free, hotels etc. (Appendix 1 & 2), all of which
ultimately by 2001 were accountable of half of SAirGroup’s employees and most of its profit.
Swissair was the very first airline to seek close ties with other airlines. The very first alliance was
KSSU group (KLM, SAS and UTA) for joint maintenance activities of wide body aircrafts.
Again the economic pressures created after formation of EU, led Swissair to go for further
alliances such as:
1. European Quality Alliance: Sabena, Austrian Airlines, SAS, Finnair
2. Atlantic Excellence: Delta, Austrian Airlines, Sabena
3. Global Excellence: Delta, Singapore Airlines
However, the failure of the Alcazar project (Swissair, KLM, SAS and Austrian Airlines) to
compete against the big three European airlines, Air France, Lufthansa and British Airways and
when most of the previous partner airlines left the alliance to solicit partnership with other big
players of European market, prompted Swissair to reevaluate its alliance strategy.
CHRONOLOGICAL OVERVIEW
Swissair did not fail from one day to the other. It was a series of internal and external events
accompanied by severe management mistakes over a period of several years that brought the
once innovative and stable airline down to bankruptcy in 2001. The following table gives a
chronological overview1 of the main events from 1990 onwards and sets the stage for the
analysis of failure in chapter four.
Year Event Description
1990 Economic
Downturn
High oil prices due to the Gulf war induce an economic
downturn.
1990 2nd
stage of
liberalization of
air traffic in
Europe
In 1990 the so-called second package of liberalisation measures
allow all European airlines to carry passengers to and from their
home countries to other EU Member States (3rd and 4th
freedoms). Also 5th freedom flights, i.e. intra-European flights
with stop-over in a third country and the right to pick-up and
drop-off passengers during the stopover, are allowed to a greater
extent. Fare and capacity restrictions are further abolished. This
results in an overcapacity of air traffic and competition on price.
1992 Switzerland votes
against EEA
membership
The Swiss people vote against a membership in the EEA. As a
consequence Swissair can’t extend its services to Greece or take-
up passengers in Italy.
1992/
1993
ALCAZAR
Alliance fails
Details of a planned fusion between Swissair (30%), KLM
(30%), SAS (30%) and AUA (10%) are revealed to the public.
After a controversial debate on national levels (“Swissair must
stay Swissair”) in all four states, the fusion fails due to national
discrepancies and public pressure.
1993 Strategic decision
to form European
System under
Swissair
leadership
After the failure of ALCAZAR Swissair has three options.
1) Continue operations as a single player (difficult due to
small domestic market)
2) Merge with a large player such as Lufthansa or British
Airways (financially the best option, but emotionally not
applicable after the ALCAZAR attempt)
1 All used sources listed in References.
3) Build a European System / Alliance under Swissair
Leadership
Swissair Executives decide to go for version three. In their
decision they frame risks as challenges, and identify the potential
take-over opportunity of the Sabena Airline as “once-in-a-
lifetime” opportunity.
1995 Swissair acquires
45% stake in
Sabena
Swissair acquires equity stakes in the Belgian airline Sabena
which has little chances to survive on its own in this very
competitive European market and is in a catastrophic financial
state.
1996 Philippe
Bruggisser joins
Swissair as COO
The Swissair board has little confidence in the current CEO and
therefore creates the new position for P. Bruggisser as COO to
manage and implement the growth strategy.
1996/
1997
McKinsey
proposes “Hunter
Strategy”
New senior
management team
joins Swissair
Swissair aims to grow and gain significant European market
share by acquiring small national airlines with a string foothold
in their respective domestic market. Among others Swissair
acquires the German airline LTU which was in severely negative
financial conditions.
A new senior management team joins Swissair.
1998 Formation of the
Qualifier Alliance
Together with Austrian Airlines (AUA) and its subsidiaries
Swissair forms the Qualifier Alliance.
1999 Delta cancels
Swissair
collaboration and
partners with Air-
France
AUA exits
Qualifier Alliance
Along with a leadership and strategy change, Delta Airlines exits
the collaboration with Swissair and partners with Air-France in
order to establish a Europe hub in Paris. Swissair rejects to join
the Delta - Air-France Alliance as a junior partner.
AUA exits the Qualifier Alliance to join Star Alliance under
Lufthansa leadership.
As a consequence Swissair is isolated in its small domestic
market. Nevertheless, management sticks to its course and
neglects the offer to join the One-World alliance under the
leadership of British Airways.
1999/
2000
Increase stake in
Sabena
Before resigning as president of the Swissair Board, Hannes
Goetz signs a contract with the Belgian government increasing
the Swissair stake in Sabena to 85%.
2000 Eric Honegger
becomes new
Eric Honegger becomes president of the Swissair board without
president of the
board
relevant experience in the airline business.
Summ
er
2000
McKinsey’s
“Shield” study
reveals severe
financial situation
A study of McKinsey gives complete transparency on the severe
financial situation of Swissair. Management does not take action
but ends the engagement of McKinsey instead. Further
acquisitions are planned.
Nov
2000
Board stops
further
acquisitions and
CEO Bruggisser
has to leave
The board stops the acquisition course. After discrepancies
between CEO and board, Mr. Bruggisser has to leave the
company. The media praise him as a manager who fought for the
sovereignty of the Swiss national airline.
Moritz Suter (CEO of Crossair, 2nd
largest Swiss airline) takes
over.
Mar
2001
CEO Moritz Suter
as well as the
entire supervisory
board resigns
After discrepancies with the board about the further development
of the Airline Moritz Suter leaves Swissair after a few months.
The entire supervisory board resigns after two independent
consultancy reports document the severe financial situation of the
firm. Mario Corti (Nestle) takes over.
Mid
2001
Restructuring
program “Change
01”
After joining the struggling airline Mario Conti tries to
restructure the airline with his program “Change 01”
Sept
2011
9-11 Terror
Attacks
As a result of the 9-11 terror attacks, air travel declines by 30%.
Major US Airlines lay-off people. Lufthansa grounds 43 of its
300 planes. Also Swissair is affected by drastic decline in
demand. Its financial situation becomes worse.
2nd
Nov
2011
Grounding of all
Swissair planes
and cancellation
of flights
Swissair in unable to pay the required fuel. UBS refuses a credit
increase.
As a consequence, Swissair had to ground all airplanes and
cancel all flights. 39.000 passengers stranded at airports
worldwide, their tickets were not recognised by other airlines.
TABLE 2: CHORONOLOGY OF EVENTS
EVALUATION: REASONS OF FAILURE
FLAWED STRATEGY
Swissair was the first European airlines which tried to collaborate with other regional airlines in
other continents to make its presence felt there. It made partnership agreements with Delta, SAS
and Singapore Airlines etc. to get its hold in other important markets as well. But it failed to
understand the importance of European market for its very survival as it was the firm base from
which it operated.
In 1992, Switzerland declined entry into EEA (European Economic Area). This hit Swissair
badly. Instead of operating freely in key European destinations, it had to go for individual
cooperation treaties with regional airlines of respective countries. It led to cumbersome
renegotiation process which deprived it of its early advantages. To counter this negative impact,
Swissair decided to go ahead with its “Alcazar project”.
Alcazar project (Alone Carriers Zigzag At Random) was a secret negotiation among Swissair,
SAS, Austrian airways and KLM to form an unprecedented alliance. It was to start with a greater
level cooperation where merger of all entities to form a large airline was the ultimate motive. But
there were lot of organizational issues, negative media coverage, ownership problems and
political pressure which finally led to termination of this project. This failure resulted in
significant loss of time and efforts on Swissair’s part.
Insight: Swissair put all its eggs in one basket without worrying about other alternatives. At last,
it could not sustain the ambitions of other partners in the project. The failure of strategy resulted
in time and efforts loss for the management of Swissair and this gave some advantage to rivals.
So an organization should not concentrate all its efforts on one initiative; it should diversify the
risk so that it does not fall flat in case of failure.
CONFLICT SWISSAIR VS. CROSSAIR
Crossair was established in 1978. It started as a regional carrier but slowly it went on expanding
its routes in Europe. Swissair acquired a minority stake in Crossair which it increased to majority
stake later. As Crossair was operating on some of the same routes where Swissair was already
present, it gave Swissair an opportunity to consolidate both airlines on such specific routes to
lower operating costs and increase efficiency. It required cooperation from both airlines. But
Swissair top management never cared for going ahead with such strategy. This led to both
airlines running parallel strategy with same kind of implication. While Swissair was pursuing its
“Hunter strategy”, Crossair was working on its “Eurocross strategy”. This resulted in Crossair
competing with Swissair in its small Swiss market. Cooperation between the two could have
provided them with much large economies of scale and potentially save Swissair from its
collapse.
Insight: In capital intensive industries like airlines, full utilization of resources alone can give
competitive advantage. Cooperation instead of competition should be the moto in such industries
for all the players to be profitable in these kinds of markets.
INFLUENCE OF PUBLICITY AND MEDIA
The fact that Swissair was a national airline raised the attention of the media and publicity
extraordinarily. Swissair executives were constantly under pressure having to comment on the
company’s shape and further development. This short chapter will certainly not argue that this
was a main cause of the company’s failure, but it is worth to recognize the media-induced
pressures executives of large and prominent firms are exposed to whenever there is a crisis and
they are responsible to make the final call. In particular “Der Blick”, a newspaper comparable to
the English yellow press with a high national circulation, went beyond its pure information
function and gave the discussions a clear spin towards national interests and sentiments. Two
examples shall demonstrate this issue.
The first example relates to the plans on forming the ALCAZAR alliance. During the debate, the
newspaper made it hard for the company’s managers to take a free, non-biased decision. In the
article2 “Swissair muss Swissair bleiben” (Swissair must stay Swissair) the chief editor of the
paper stated: “In the planned wedding between the four airlines, Swissair is not just the most
beautiful bride. It is the prey.” Through such comments, a pure business decision is radicalized
and lifted to the level of politics. Supporting the option to join the alliance is framed as treason.
The second example points out how the media (again “Der Blick”) tend to personalize news
coverage. When it became clear that CEO Bruggisser had failed with the Hunter Strategy and the
supervisory board stopped his course and even considered selling the airline, “Der Blick” again
provoked national sentiments by stating: “Philipp Bruggisser fought like a lion. There a too few
people like him… even if he should fail, at least he tried: creatively and persistent. He is a hero, a
management hero.”3
Although the statement is completely unqualified from a business
perspective, it makes it hard for members of the supervisory board to find convincing arguments
supporting the change in strategy.
Both examples demonstrate how big the pressure of public awareness can get and one can image
that sound decision making certainly becomes very difficult if the reaction of publicity and
media always needs to be considered. In the case of Swissair there were many similar incidents.
This shall not count as an explanation why the company failed, but public pressure on individual
managers and management teams certainly limits their freedom in decision making and
contributes to bad management choices.
2 http://chronik.geschichte-schweiz.ch/swissair-debakel-grounding.html 3 http://chronik.geschichte-schweiz.ch/swissair-debakel-grounding.html
GOVERNANCE AND PERSONALITIES
Swissair went for “Hunter strategy” of acquiring small players instead of seeking for alliances.
This strategy stemmed from the need of political control of this organization which represented
Swiss national pride. Many times management took rash decisions which were motivated by
political and social compulsions rather than economical ones. Many political appointees who had
little knowledge of aviation industry spoiled the chances of any growth by making illogical
decisions.
For example, Swissair CEO Phillippe Bruggisser came under attack from outsiders for taking an
acquisition strategy instead of that of making regional alliances since whatever new airlines
Swissair had acquired were having serious financial difficulties and operating in lower market
segments. This significantly degraded Swissair brand name. It was CEO’s decision which even
board members were also not happy with. They thought that Bruggisser was playing power
control game instead of worrying about company’s profitability and image. National symbol and
pride became more important than shareholder’s interests.
Corporate governance of Swissair was also ruined by intervention of Swiss law. The day-to-day
decisions were taken by executives but the real power rested with board which was mostly
appointed by political elites. There was no clear segregation of power between management and
board. Board members were often chosen because of their political or banking connections. This
allowed entry of non-professional into Swissair which led to bad decisions and ultimately its
collapse. Apart from that, system of corporate governance in Switzerland at that time was such
that political and societal norms were given priority over financial and economic norms.
Addition to this, Swiss government had 30% stake in Swissair which allowed it to decide who
the CEO was and how he was to conduct business. This compelled management to work in
congruence of political and societal agenda of Swiss government which ignored economic
implications. At last, this led to failure of organization
Insight: public sector enterprises should give more emphasis on meritocracy within the
organization. Strength of corporate governance decides the effectiveness of checks and balances
in the system. If organization wants to avoid failure, it must push for strong corporate
governance within the organization.
BAD EXECUTION
Bad Execution of Hunter Strategy has led to the failure of Swissair. Swissair in desperate
attempts to capture market share, kept in pouring more money (4.1 billion CHF when the
maximum was set to 300 million CHF), took unnecessary risks of alleviating the financial
condition of the members of the alliance and also targeted some of the bigger players in the
aviation industry (Italy). This has put more pressure on Swissair financials which has ultimately
led to its failure. They should have implemented the strategy at a slower pace with pilot studies
in between to know the effectiveness of the strategy.
FINANCIAL ANALYSIS
From the financial data it can be seen that, the EBIT for the company has seen a sudden
depreciation in 2000. Before that, Swissair enjoyed a very strong financial status and is
considered as the flying bank of the world. The huge amount of loss caused in the FY2000 can
be accredited to the widespread equity based alliance forming Hunter Strategy adopted by
Swissair, with an aim to capture 20% of the market share in Europe. The Hunter strategy was
adopted in 1997 and was implemented in 1998 when the Qualifier alliance was created. Till
1999, Swissair spent around 4.1 billion CHF for purchasing significant shares in variety of
airlines. Swissair also was forced to pump in liquidity to keep many of its financially struggling
airlines afloat so that the alliance is maintained. In September 2000, Swissair realized that the
hunter strategy has failed and the board has to strategize the exit scenario of several of its loss
making investments. In fact, majority of the investments made by Swissair during this period
were making huge losses. Even worse for Swissair was that, in all its alliances, the pride of being
the national airlines of Switzerland and the hunger to capture European market share has led
Swissair to take full responsibility for its partner’s financial obligations, which has led to huge
cash outflow from Swissair.
Moreover, the alliance with low cost airlines just to capture market share, led to the dilution of
brand image of Swissair as well as it also eradicated their ability to charge price premium from
their consumers, who had always considered Swissair as a premium airlines. All this factors
along with the terrorist attacks had led to consumers not opting for Swissair which had caused
SAirGroup to see negative EBIT (111 million CHF) for the first time in the FY2000.
In million CHF 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000
Total Operating Revenue
8212 10556 11297 13002 16229
EBIT 344 658 700 643 (2592)
Net Profit(loss)/year
(497) 324 361 273 (2885)
Liabilities and Shareholder Equity
Liabilities 9708 10191 11181 13673 19055
Shareholder’s Equity
2109 2439 3549 4181 1160
TABLE 3: FINANCIALS FOR FIVE YEARS
EBIT by division (million CHF)
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001
SAirLines 264 354 188 35 138 SAirServices 127 145 165 162 (6)
SAirLogistics 43 33 6 99 17
SAirRelations 181 153 269 300 56
SAirGroup 43 15 95 68 (111)
SAirLines Investments - (80) (3256) (137) Total EBIT 658 700 643 (2592) (43)
TABLE 4: BREAKDOWN OF EBIT BY BUSINESS UNIT
TAKEAWAYS AND CONCLUSIONS
The case of Swissair can be considered as an amalgamation of corporate faulty decision making
and a collusion of many external factors as well. There are a lot of things to learn from the case
of Swissair:
1. Managerial Hubris:
Managerial hubris is one of the main reasons of a lot of corporate failures. The pride of
being the national carrier of Switzerland has made the management over confident about
the airlines. That is the reason they did not accepted the alliance with bigger airlines like
Ari France and Lufthansa with the fear that they will be treated as a feeder airlines.
Instead they went in and created alliance with several smaller airlines where they could
be treated as the undisputed leader. But as is the case in front of us, the strategy failed
miserably creating a situation where the airline was not even able to fund refueling of its
fleet.
2. Proper implementation of strategy
As per the Hunter Strategy suggested by the consulting company, Swissair was supposed
to target only the small countries and the maximum investment was set to a maximum of
300 million CHF. But Swissair took the risk and pumped in 4.1 billion CHF into the
Hunter Strategy and also targeted bigger economies like Italy. Thus proper
implementation of strategies is a key driver in success.
3. Proper brand communication and strategizing accordingly
Swissair is positioned as a premium brand in the mind of the consumers. When the
company started forming alliance with low cost struggling airlines, the perception of the
brand changed among consumers. The regular consumers of Swissair, who are the
business class people who generally are ready to pay more money for better services,
started dumping Swissair for other airlines. Thus brand communication and a good brand
image is very much necessary for success.
4. Grab opportunities
When the big airlines approached Swissair for alliance after the formation of EU,
Swissair denied forming the alliance and instead chose to compete against them for
market share, knowing that it is a very small airline considering the liberalization of
European aviation sector where Switzerland is not a member nation. This has led
Swissair to make desperate attempts to gain market share and was grounded completely.
5. Prevent cannibalization
Swissair managers allowed Crossair to set up another hub at Basel and start its operations
independently. It cannibalized the operations of Swissair which had hub in Zurich.
Instead Swiss air should have worked in association with Crossair in developing their
business.
REFERENCES
BBC News: “Swissair grounds all flights”, URL: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/1574658.stm
BBC News: “Thousands stranded in airline crisis”, URL: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/1577609.stm
European Commission: “History Market Integration”, URL: http://ec.europa.eu/transport/modes/air/internal_market/integration_history_en.htm
Jud, Markus: Das Swissair Dabakel, URL: http://chronik.geschichte-schweiz.ch/swissair-debakel-grounding.html (German)
Knorr, A. and Arndt, A.: “Swissair’s Collapse – An Economic Analysis”, Materialien des Wissenschaftsschwerpunktes „Globalisierung der Weltwirtschaft“, Bd. 28, September 2003
Manager Magazin: „Der Absturz der "fliegenden Bank" - eine Chronik“, URL: http://www.manager-magazin.de/unternehmen/artikel/0,2828,160189,00.html (German)
Wikipedia: Alcazar, URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcazar_(airline)
Nwabueze, U. and Mileski, J.: “The challenge of effective governance: the case of Swiss Air”, in Corporate Governance, Vol. 8, No. 5, 2008