I remember a case study on Pan Am where the general market considered the Airline as a Titanic of the Industry, supposed to be unsinkable 😊
Briefly Pan Am failed precisely because it was too big to fail
The Airline had been a virtual monopoly operating and plying in an extremely government friendly set up, where the government could set the prices and the rules and decide who flew across which route
One day the Government ended this and gave a “No holds barred” freedom to all Airlines to establish a free market where Airlines could fly wherever they liked and charge whatever they wanted to.
It was deregulation.
Happened when Jimmy Carter or Ford was the President, before Reagan
Pan Am simply couldn't adapt to this change
Like many of the big companies today who live on Government dole and have a monopolistic control on markets, Pan Am had presumed it's monopoly was permanent and had invested money into a large number of big aircraft especially the 747s
They had piled up a lot of debt, and just when it was time to pay back the debt, deregulation came in and led to plenty of new entrants in commercial aviation all over the states
There were lower, cheaper prices, sometimes cheaper by half or more and more efficient connections, given Pan Ams ignoring of the domestic market for years
Operating costs were rising due to the rising costs of aircraft fuel, and the 747s were inefficient with their fuel
So like every other failure, it was a combination of rising debts, rising operational costs and mismanagement
Their decisions to sell profitable assets like hotel chains and service chains they owned instead of spinning off some profitable divisions or diluting ownership, caused the end to come faster
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