Aeromexico's Mulinelli talks:
- The carrier's new segmented focus in corporate sales department
- The status of the Delta Air Lines joint venture
- Premium considerations
Aeromexico global head of sales Giancarlo Mulinelli stepped into his role in 2022, and the carrier since has made several changes to how it approaches the corporate market. In early April, Mulinelli talked with BTN senior editor Donna M. Airoldi about the Mexico-based airline's new approach and the state of corporate travel demand. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
BTN: What percentage of Aeromexico's global revenue is from the corporate segment?
Giancarlo Mulinelli: It's a huge, huge focus for us as a flag carrier of Mexico and the only legacy carrier of Mexico. … Today, corporate represents roughly 25 percent of our revenue. That's through global corporations [and] also through [small and midsize enterprise] accounts.
BTN: Is that the same percentage on routes between Mexico and the U.S.?
Mulinelli: I would say it's higher because of the different industries that have penetrated the Mexican market in the last couple of years. Also, with our integration with Delta [Air Lines], if you look at our network, through listening and understanding the needs of many corporations, today we have flights from Detroit to León, to the automotive regions of Mexico. So yes, it's definitely higher. Roughly, it's around 30 percent.
BTN: What has changed in the last couple of years that has affected your corporate focus?
Mulinelli: Mexico as a country in the last couple of years has seen a lot of global investment through different industries—the auto sector, pharma, energy. We make sure that we're focused on this, that we have dedicated teams, that we have the right products and services out there.
We're [also] going now on nine years of our joint venture with Delta. At Aeromexico we've benefited; we've had the blessing of being part of the Delta family and benchmarking what they do to make sure that we become much more successful. And we continue to benchmark them. Making sure that we're reinforcing the needs of our corporations has been a big focus—on dedicated global corporate teams, on dedicated [travel management company] teams, also developing new departments in the last couple of years. A corporate sales development team that's looking at making sure, through our data, that we're capturing all the opportunities out there and working with our different departments in revenue management, planning in an integrated way.
BTN: In what ways have you changed the sales team to better support corporate clients?
Mulinelli: A little more than five years ago, Aeromexico did not have a corporate sales development team. [Now] we have a corporate sales development team. We have a global sales support team. We have a dedicated global account management team. We have a dedicated SME team. We have a dedicated TMC team, and this has all happened in the last five years. … Again, I think we've benefited from having a great consultant with Delta. … But most importantly, we've had the support of our management team, understanding that this is just very core to our business, core to Aeromexico.
BTN: Tell me more about your SME evolution.
Mulinelli: As we evolve, we do have, for the first time at Aeromexico, an inside sales team to cater to those smaller accounts and work side by side with our TMCs to make sure that we have the right products and services and that we're understanding this market. Having these inside sales teams, we're able to look more closely at data. … It's something new for us at Aeromexico, but something very important as we see SMEs continue to grow and evolve and have different needs from global accounts.
BTN: How has SME revenue grown from five years ago?
Mulinelli: We've seen double-digit [percentage] growth in the last five years. It's between 10 [percent] and 15 percent, and that's something that we continue to monitor very, very closely.
BTN: You mentioned Delta. The U.S. Department of Transportation and Department of Justice want to dismantle the joint venture, and Delta and Aeromexico have appealed in court. Where does that currently stand?
Mulinelli: We continue to go through this legal process. We don't have further details on this. I know it has been extended for the end of the year. So as of now, [it's] business as usual.
BTN: On Delta's Q1 earnings call, one executive said the carrier would pull back capacity from Mexico because of recent security issues and decreased demand. Is Aeromexico planning to increase capacity to replace what Delta might pull?
Mulinelli: We have seen some really good stable demand on the corporate side. … We're following very closely any changes on travel policies. There were a couple weeks that we did see some decrease, but we have seen a recent nice spike in demand going back to levels of 2025. So again, we're staying very close to our corporations. … Investments continue to come in very strong in the Mexico market from all over the world.
BTN: How has Aeromexico grown in capacity and destinations?
Mulinelli: After Covid, we've grown our fleet 70 percent. We had about 95 planes. We will finish the year with over 170. This year, we just received our 24th [Boeing] 787 Dreamliner. With that plane, we've just launched Mexico City-Barcelona at the end of March. … We're also launching Monterey-Paris. In our summer season, we will be flying more than 70 flights a week to Europe. That's the largest that we've ever had in the history of Aeromexico. We fly to Seoul, and we fly to Japan, to Narita. We've seen some massive growth in the last couple of years.
But we continue to listen to our clients. We continue to make sure that we're in the markets that we need to be in. That's why you see markets today like Detroit-Monterey or Detroit-León, Guanajuato, [as] we're catering to the automotive industry. Then we have additional focuses. [For] the banking industry, we have a Dreamliner flying daily to New York JFK. We have a Dreamliner flying daily to L.A., ensuring that we're covering the needs of different industries.
We have one of the largest [Boeing] 737 Max fleets with the average [of] less than three years. Those planes are to cater and to continue to grow in the U.S. markets. As markets develop, and as we see demand growing and a stable fuel price industry, we'll definitely be looking at more and better opportunities … Also, Latin America has been a huge expansion for us.
BTN: How is current corporate demand compared with last year? What are corporate travel managers looking for?
Mulinelli: We are seeing slightly year-over-year stronger corporate demand. I think with the strong peso in Mexico, that brings a lot of opportunities for us. … That gives a lot of confidence in the marketplace for investment, for demand, for travel. … One of the things that we're very, very proud about is Aeromexico for the second year in a row, we're now recognized as the most punctual airline by Cirium.
BTN: Have corporate negotiations shifted?
Mulinelli: It's all about added value. In the last couple of years, we've been very focused on becoming a consultative selling team that continues to bring value through our corporate priority, through being an on-time airline, to continue to make sure that we have their back when they need it through our global sales support. Having, again, dedicated teams by industries and different segmentations has been also a huge focus. Collaboration with our JV partner at Delta has been very important as well.
Mexico City International Airport, which is our home airport, will continue to elevate the experience. We just launched our new check-in counters. We will have the new premier lounge and international lounge by the end of this month as well … which I know is important for our frequent travelers. For us, it's just continuing to elevate the experience, to continue to invest what we need to invest in a smart way that caters for our corporate clients.
BTN: What is Aeromexico doing regarding premium offerings?
Mulinelli: The new lounges in Mexico City. … Right now we have Diamond seats on our [Boeing] 787-9s. We do still have -8s in our fleet. Those have a different configuration: two-by-two. We will now be going to one-two-one. … We offer free texting on board of our aircraft if you're flying in Premier Class. On long haul, we have free Wi-Fi, which I know is very important to our corporate clients … There's a lot of projects that we're looking into in the next couple of years to enhance and elevate the Premier experience.
BTN: Where is Aeromexico on its path to modern retailing and distribution?
Mulinelli: Our [New Distribution Capability] rollout began in Mexico. We have some pilot programs. We want to make sure that we're hitting on all cylinders and not committing any errors or doing anything that disrupts. It's more on the OTA side and the leisure side that we've started this. While we continue to strengthen integration stability, we continue to talk to our corporations. We want to continue to sell the amazing added values and the experience that Aeromexico offers. But we've had this mindset of working together with our TMCs and our corporations to make sure that we're covering all their needs before we launch anything. I would say we're very aligned with what Delta's doing as well.
BTN: What are Aeromexico's sustainability offerings for corporates?
Mulinelli: We have a dedicated team on sustainability now, and it's led by our vice president of sustainability. We have had a couple flights of 100 percent [sustainable aviation fuel]. We are working to launch a new corporate SAF product, learning a lot from what Delta's doing. Frankly, there's no production right now in Latin America, so we have to buy it in other places of the world, but we are committed to our 2050 [net-zero goal] and what all airlines are committed to.
BTN: Do you have a timeframe on that SAF program?
Mulinelli: By end of the third quarter. … We're already in talks with a lot of corporations. We're determined to have our SAF program out there in conjunction also with our TMCs as well.