Low-cost carrier development under airline-within-airline strategy: Bibliometric analysis and systematic literature review

Abstract

With the advent of aviation deregulation, the rapid development of low-cost carriers (LCCs) has posed significant competitive pressures to established airlines, particularly full-service carriers (FSCs). In response to these challenges, FSCs have undergone substantial operational strategy reforms. One such response has been adopting the airline-within-airline (AWA) strategy, wherein FSCs establish subsidiary LCCs. These subsidiary LCCs are either utilised as fighting brands to compete with major LCC competitors directly or to expand the market coverage of the parent airline. However, not all subsidiary LCCs have succeeded, and their impacts on the market competition structure and outcomes have varied significantly. We aim to provide a thorough review of existing studies and address a series of vital questions, including the market impact of AWA, incentives for adopting such strategy, and the successful operation patterns of subsidiary LCCs under the AWA framework. To ensure the breadth and depth of our review, we construct an article database and employ semantic analysis to capture relevant studies' titles, keywords, and abstracts. We summarise and report the adopted research methodologies, aviation markets studied, keywords and author co-occurrence networks, as well as research trends and gaps in previous literature. Through bibliometric analysis, we identify the importance of subsidiary autonomy and coordinating labour policy between low-cost and full-service group members. Meanwhile, the changing dynamic of airline competition requires flexible adjustment in route configuration, and up-to-date empirical investigation is necessary to understand airline group strategy. The significant disruption brought by the COVID-19 pandemic has not been detailly studied for AWA. Our literature review could provide insights into the current state of research in this area while also identifying future research opportunities.