EgyptAir Chief Talks Growth Ambitions And Challenges

EgyptAir plans to double its passenger numbers to 22 million over the next five years and expand its fleet from 65 to 125 aircraft. Overseeing that growth plan is chairman and CEO Yehia Zakaria, who has headed the EgyptAir Group since 2022.

In an exclusive interview with ATW, Zakaria outlined how the Star Alliance airline’s 2025-2029 strategic plan will take shape. He made clear that the biggest challenge to achieving his goals will be acquiring the aircraft needed to support planned growth while the industry continues to endure supply chain delays and constraints.

“How can I implement a strategic plan, which is based on the number of aircraft that I have to get, when I go to the aircraft manufacturers, and they cannot abide by any delivery schedules? That’s why it’s very difficult to implement the strategic plan, when you don’t have the main outline,” Zakaria said.

“I’ll give you an example. We have a passenger-revenue figure [for 2025] based on aircraft deliveries according to the contract. We’ve received information that we will not get the aircraft as planned in the first quarter; they will be delayed to the last quarter. That’s a three-quarters’ slip without revenue we planned for. So, that means the whole plan will change.”

As a result, Zakaria acknowledged that getting from 65 to 125 aircraft by 2029 may not be possible.

“We can see some kind of slip. So maybe, according to the plan, we’re going to have 110-111 aircraft and then we will continue to acquire aircraft. We had a chance to get some aircraft from Airbus, but if I push the button on the contract right now, we are talking about the first delivery in 2030 or 2031. We actually started acquiring aircraft early, because we felt we had to do something before the strategic plan was approved. We signed a contract to lease 18 [Boeing] 737 MAXs from Air Lease [Corp.] and we are acquiring 10 A350-900s from Airbus. Delivery will be before the end of 2025,” he explained.

Nevertheless, Zakaria remains convinced that getting to a fleet size of at least 110—hopefully 125—must remain the goal, so he is evaluating other ways to do that.

LOOKING TO LEASE

“We’re going to issue an RFP to continue leasing very soon. I’m talking about narrowbodies and widebodies, maybe 20:20, something like that. It’s not submitted yet,” Zakaria said in November. We are also negotiating with Airbus and Boeing to continue acquiring a small number of widebody aircraft. We are already close to completing that with Airbus, because it’s an extension of the basic contract options on the A350. It’s not a concrete number. We have our numbers, but maybe it will change, according to the plan.”

In terms of passenger growth, Zakaria admits that plans to grow from 11 million per year to 22 million in 2029 is still “a complete puzzle.”

He explained, “We have to increase the capacity of [Cairo Airport], because it’s reaching maximum capacity. We are looking to be a real hub. The current proportion of connecting flights to direct flights is about 35% compared with 65-70%, something like that. We would like to have it at 50:50, by increasing connecting flights.”

However, this is contingent on Cairo Airport building a fourth terminal to increase capacity by more than 30 million passengers annually. Talks on a plan to do that have started, Zakaria said, but nothing is certain yet.

EgyptAir is also looking to expand its network from 82 destinations, including domestic routes, to up to 100. The additional routes would all be international—to the Middle East, Asia, North America and Africa—but this is again contingent on having the additional aircraft.

PARTNERSHIPS

EgyptAir has 14 codeshares and Zakaria is on the lookout for more partnerships. “Every time airlines ask us to have a codeshare, we are very keen,” he said.

While new long-haul routes form part of the strategic plan, Zakaria is also focused on expanding the airline’s African operations. As an example, he mentioned that the Nigerian transport minister visited Egypt in late 2024 and held meetings with various aviation stakeholders. He added there was a strong appetite for African travel, particularly in Egypt, which has a population of 120 million.

However, African governments and airlines must cooperate more to tap this potential, he said, flagging high taxes, expensive airport fees, weak infrastructure and visa restrictions as barriers to African connectivity. “Africa is not unified. Every country operates within their own regulations. We have to unify the regulations to make future cooperations much easier.”

While the uncertain aircraft delivery schedules place a question mark over EgyptAir’s growth plan—a problem that many airlines are dealing with—a positive is that EgyptAir Group, a holding company with a cluster of subsidiaries, has been profitable for the last two consecutive fiscal years, with most of the revenues coming from the airline itself, Zakaria said.

The Group subsidiaries include cargo, maintenance, training, catering and duty-free operations. Zakaria said the training facility was maximizing its utilization, “operating day and night, 24/7” to train pilots for EgyptAir and other airlines.

EgyptAir’s training division already has several flight simulators, covering types including the Airbus A320neo, A330, Boeing 737 and 777. “We have an ambitious plan to have different simulators,” Zakaria said.