Air China Flies into the Future with PROS RM Solutions

Leveraging PROS world-class revenue management solutions to innovate, grow, and meet new challenges in the ever-changing airline business.

Air China is China's sole flag carrier and a member of the world’s largest airline alliance, Star Alliance. It was previously the official airline partner for the Beijing 2008 Olympic and Paralympic Games, and has been selected as an official partner for the Beijing 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. Air China is a market leader in air passenger transportation, air cargo and other aviation services.

Air China’s achievements include launching two classes of services for passengers who want the extra comforts of lie-flat seats and full-flight service as well as super remote monitoring and control capabilities that link operations with satellite and air-ground communications. When it comes to revenue management, Air China leverages PROS groundbreaking forecasting and networking optimization science to determine the fare mixes that maximize revenue uplift on every departure.

Optimizing Revenue on Every Flight

Gone are the days of relying on manual processes to manage seat pricing. For an airline to realize its true revenue potential, it must employ powerful data science.

“With new airlines emerging, routes becoming more complicated, and competition growing fiercer, the PROS revenue management solution has been transformative for us,” says Xin Wang, Senior Manager of Revenue Management for Air China.

Since 2014, Air China has been using PROS RM to determine which seats to sell to which passenger, when to do so, and at what price. This is accomplished by calculating the value of each and every seat available based on passenger demand and expected revenue. PROS RM enables Air China’s revenue management analysts to optimize its entire network to determine revenue-maximizing controls for both connecting and point-of-sale traffic, day in and day out.

“The PROS solution has had a profound impact on our management methodology, enabling us to scientifically and effectively solve the drawbacks of traditional inventory management,” Wang says. “We have much more sophistication in our forecasting, fare valuation, and management of connecting flights, so our analysts can manage inventory and drive revenue growth with much greater precision.”

Moving forward in the post-pandemic world, the PROS RM solution will enable Air China to fine-tune its revenue management to adapt and function more optimally to demand that has become more volatile, dynamic, and uncertain.

Streamlining Group Business

Air China is also putting smart science to work to meet the demands of group bookings. Group reservations typically require multiple layers of approval across revenue management and group sales teams, creating long customer booking delays. The PROS group sales solution solves that problem by providing a fast, easy, and automated process that performs real-time group revenue management, decision-making, and pricing.

“Managing group bookings has become a seamless, integrated process,” Wang says. “Using the PROS solution has enabled us to improve the group booking process and maximize the revenue contribution from our groups business.”

Aiming High in Innovation and Market Leadership 

Digital transformation is a high priority for Air China. The airline’s goal is to leverage data and artificial intelligence to form a new retail model that integrates online services, offline experiences, and modern logistics. It strives to take the lead, strengthening its direct sales capabilities and providing passengers with a new, multidimensional air transportation experience.

To drive these initiatives, especially in the new era of air travel beyond COVID-19, it is more important than ever to optimize network revenue that is critical to performance. Moving forward, Air China will continuously make enhancements to its revenue management capabilities to stay on the industry’s cutting edge.

We will continue to integrate new capabilities to adapt to market competition, improve our competitiveness on itineraries, and leverage customer shopping data to improve the customer experience,” Wang says.