The chief executive of Wizz Air has in the past stated that his budget carrier, based in eastern Europe but also well-known to travellers out of Luton airport, could be as big as Easyjet within five years (Robert Lea writes). It was a statement of bold ambition.
Before the lockdowns Wizz was carrying 40 million passengers a year, making it less than half the size of Easyjet which, if the pandemic hadn’t intervened, would have been handling 100 million a year.
Yet the Wizz comparison should be more with Ryanair. At the equivalent stage of Ryanair’s development, a decade and half ago, the Irish budget airline was expanding exponentially. Easyjet has become a much more mature airline, focusing on flying to primary airports and giving