United expands foothold in Africa, Boeing slow plane delivery hampers expansion

Wole Shadare (New York)

One of the United States biggest airlines, United,  said it wants to grow more routes in Africa, stressing that one of its desires is to add cities in Africa as part of its growth plans

The Chief Executive Officer of United Airlines, Scott Kirby told Aviation Metric in New York, United States, last week at the unveiling of its new United Polaris Studio suites, to give travellers new travel experience in its B787-9 aircraft, said. “We are now the largest U.S. carrier flying to Africa. We fly to many destinations. We have been growing, we plan to grow and add more cities.”

The airline is expanding its presence in Africa with new routes and increased frequency to existing destinations.

 In 2025, United plans to offer its largest-ever schedule to Africa, including new service to Dakar, Senegal, starting May 23rd, and increased service to Accra, Ghana, and Lagos, Nigeria. They also launched direct flights from New York to Marrakech, Morocco, underscoring its plans to open up the continent to direct flight services from America.

He stated that the slow pace of expansion was hampered by the slow pace of aircraft delivery by Boeing.

His words, “We would have been even bigger today, but Boeing has been a little behind on aircraft deliveries, or we would have added some of those routes already. So we are excited about Africa. We leaned into it heavily during the pandemic, and it is done well, and we are going to continue to grow.”

“We are an important link, particularly between Newark and Washington, D.C. It is not just about commercial air service. It’s about connecting people and uniting the world, and those links are critical to the future of Africa, and to have the Americans involved and connected to the continent, really critical.”

He disclosed that the airline was on the verge of having Wi-Fi on all its aircraft starting from last week, with the first commercial flight with Starlink on any of the flights.

“On Wi-Fi, the great news is we are now going to have the best Wi-Fi in the sky. Starting this week, the first commercial flight with Starlink on any of the large U.S. airlines is going to come. We are going to have the whole fleet eventually replaced with that. It is going to be free. It will be free today. The reason it’s not free today is that there is not enough bandwidth. If you make it free, and this happens on some of our competitors when it’s free, and everyone gets on, it doesn’t work for anybody.”

“So, putting Starlink on, we are going to get it done as fast as possible, and they go way faster than any other vendor we have ever dealt with or any other partner we’ve ever dealt with. Having fast, high-speed Wi-Fi is what you need to make free work.”

Kirby praised US President Donald Trump for his goal in bringing back what he described as high-quality jobs to the United States;  the kinds of jobs he noted that United creates.

“One of the few companies left in the country that creates the kind of jobs where you can make a six-digit income, you can support a family, buy a house, send your kids to college, even if you only have a high school education and those are the kinds of jobs. I think that goal is laudable. I think tariffs on their own probably are not enough to make that happen.”

“But I have said the goal is laudable. Many of us here in this country and your country share the goal to create those kinds of careers for people. And so I have said the goal is laudable. I’ve also said everyone should kind of take a breath because we are not at the end game yet.”

“We are not the new normal yet. I mean, you saw what happened this week. Let us all just take a breath and wait till we get to sort of a new normal and see where all of that sorts out, which is what I think we should do.

Wole Shadare