The low-cost airline chief battling Ryanair for control of Europe’s skies

As Covid plunged the airline industry into chaos in 2020, the boss of Wizz Air made an audacious move.

The entrepreneurial spirit that ultimately led him to launch Wizz in 2004, with backing from US investors, was evident from a young age. Váradi excelled at maths at school, and remembers, aged about nine, selling the answers to the day’s tests to his classmates. “I bought my first soccer ball as a result, and I was so proud of it, because I don’t think the family could afford that. But I was able to buy it.

But the final, and biggest, of the “black swans” hit last year when Airbus engine supplier Pratt & Whitney began recalling planes for inspections, amid concerns over contaminants in the powdered metal used to make their turbofan engines. Again, Wizz Air was the worst-hit airline in Europe. Some City analysts now doubt the growth plans are realistic, and Wizz’s troubles have been seized on by its rivals. Ryanair’s boss Michael O’Leary has written Wizz off as a challenger, and has taken to issuing press releases announcing “rescue fares” whenever the airline retreats from a route.

“I think kind of dented the morale of the company. We looked at it as an economic issue, or a financial issue. And I don’t think we gave sufficient credit for the morale impact of it. So that’s clear early learning, we have not fallen into the trap again,” he says. Váradi believes this background has given him an edge over executives who have spent their lives in the aviation industry. He does not mention anyone by name, but reading between the lines, under the Váradi school of management, most of his rivals are not perfectly suited to the job.

Ryanair Michael-Oleary Lufthansa

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