A visualized bibliometric analysis of mapping research trends of airline business models (ABMs) from 1985 to 2021

Abstract

Deregulation and liberalization acts have contributed to the emergence of various airline business models (ABMs) in the airline industry by putting competition ahead. Influenced by catastrophic crises, increased competition, and changes in customer needs and expectations, airlines have had to innovate their business models or converge them with others over time. Thus, the topic of ABM has attracted tremendous scholarly attention. However, the extant literature lacks a visualized bibliometric study that investigates the evolution of ABM in depth. In this context, this paper employs a comprehensive visualized bibliometric analysis through CiteSpace software to present the evolution of the topic “airline business model” and its possible trends in the post Covid-19 era by benefiting 652 articles on ABMs published during the period from 1985 to 2021. The results reveal that studies on ABMs have increased, especially over the past few years, and Journal of Air Transport Management is the leader outlet preferred by authors on this topic. In addition, although studies on low-cost carriers have an obvious dominance over studies on other ABMs, the results provide some evidence that studies on long-haul business models will increasingly continue in the future.