Helsinki to Host CAPA World Aviation Summit in October

Aviation CEOs from around the world will gather in Finland in October at the CAPA World Aviation Summit.

The CAPA World Aviation Summit 2015, to be held on 7-8 October, will be the first CAPA conference organised in Finland.

The summit will review the strategic, commercial, growth, regulatory and earnings prospects for the year ahead and to debate the hot issues that are garnering airline CEOs’ attention.

The two-day conference is expected to bring approximately 200 airline CEOs, aviation decision-makers and experts from throughout the world to Finland.

"It is great to be able to bring such a large-scale and important air traffic industry event to Finland for the first time. This demonstrates that our active work in developing air traffic has been noticed around the world and that people trust our expertise," said Joni Sundelin, director at Finavia. "Hosting the conference supports our active route development measures. It is a fantastic opportunity to present Finland as a destination to airlines and increase the airlines' awareness of Helsinki Airport and Finland’s main regional airports. However, we cannot do this alone but need the help of active local tourism operators to bring out the attractiveness of areas and make airlines interested about them. A well-functioning airport alone will not attract an international airline to a new airport, since competition for airport routes is extremely stiff."

Helsinki Airport, operated by Finavia, is an important hub between Europe and Asia. In addition, Helsinki Airport's fees charged from the airlines are among the lowest and transit times among the shortest in Europe.

Peter Harbison, CAPA’s executive chairman., said, "We are delighted to partner with Finavia, a world class airport operator and leader in many aspects, as host of our fourth annual World Aviation Summit and to bring this important event to Helsinki. The event will tackle the key disruptive trends to the global aviation and corporate travel markets, with a focus on the regulatory issues and barriers that are constraining our industry."

It is predicted that the traffic to Asia will experience a rapid growth in coming years. During the last five years, the number of seats available from Helsinki Airport to Asia has grown by almost 45%.

"There are currently direct flights from Helsinki to 15 destinations in Asia. This number is remarkable compared to other Nordic airports. In addition to short transfer times, we have invested in services for transit passengers travelling to Asia. For example, we offer Japanese and Korean passengers an automatic border control while free and limitless Wi-Fi connection is available to all our passengers," said Sundelin.