Garuda Indonesia

Transformation, growth and safety

For Indonesia’s flag carrier, it’s been a tough decade since emerging out of the 1997 Asian financial crisis. Increasing competition, a major accident and terrorist bombings in Bali have all made it hard for the carrier to break out of what Garuda Indonesia CEO Emirsyah Satar calls the downward cycle.

“Our yield was decreasing, our product was below standard, our reservation system also was outdated . . . too many aircraft and ageing aircraft also; aircraft utilisation is lower than the market,” he told Australian Aviation at the airline’s headquarters in Jakarta in early September.