KLM CEO Marjan Rintel on China, Pilot Shortages, and Schiphol

12.06.2024 - 07:55 / skift.com / Delta Air Lines / Summer Travel / Paris Olympics / Pieter Elbers / Marjan Rintel / Gordon Smith / Schiphol Airport

Have you been to Amsterdam? If so, there’s a good chance you’ve flown on a plane without knowing it. The company, better known by its catchier acronym KLM, is the flag carrier of the Netherlands and the world’s oldest airline operating under its original name.

From its mega hub at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport, it serves more than 170 global destinations with a fleet of distinctive bright blue aircraft. It’s a cornerstone of the SkyTeam alliance, and counts Delta Air Lines and Virgin Atlantic among its key commercial partners.

But a proud history is no guarantee of future success. As recent challenges have graphically illustrated, KLM’s long-term relevance in an increasingly competitive industry cannot be taken for granted.

Thankfully, Marjan Rintel is no stranger to problem-solving. She spent 15 years in various operational and marketing positions across KLM before leaving to be President and CEO of Dutch Railways. She returned to the airline in 2022, taking on the CEO role from Pieter Elbers, who is now CEO of Indian low-cost carrier IndiGo.

In the latest of our Leaders of Travel: Skift C-Suite Series, we sit down with Rintel as she leads KLM into a busy summer season. 

Skift: We’re speaking here at the start of June, with hopefully some good visibility for the coming season. How is this summer shaping up for KLM? 

Marjan Rintel: Bookings are still looking fine and stable. Around the world, there’s still not all the aircraft capacity in place, which is helping. For us, it’s most important that we are running well operationally. We have improved a lot after the first quarter, and the May holiday [peak] was very successful, so we’re looking forward to this summer.

Your airline is a critical component of the Air France-KLM Group. Are passengers shifting their flights through Amsterdam this summer to avoid the Paris Olympics?

What we’re currently seeing is that our outlook is not going up, but it’s not going down. But we do see a difference in Paris. They [passengers] are avoiding Paris because of the Olympics, but we still need to see if there’s any effect of shifting from Paris to Amsterdam. As we speak today, it’s still stable. 

We’ve seen operational problems with your new fleet of regional Embraer E2 jets. What’s the latest on their engine issues?

If it’s flying, the E2 is a brilliant plane. Customers love it, pilots love it. It’s really efficient, the product is great. The issue is with the engines, not the plane. There are [KLM] planes grounded, but it’s also not only KLM, it is many other airlines as well, including the Airbus A220s from Air France. But it will harm us for a period of time, that’s for sure.

We’re meeting with Pratt and Whitney, who make the engines, to see what’s coming up.