European air traffic has finally surpassed its pre-pandemic benchmark, with Summer 2025 registering 3% growth over 2024 and an average of 35,122 daily flights. The peak day (Friday, 18 July, with 37,037 flights) came within just 191 movements of the all-time record set in 2019. New milestones were also reached: the busiest weekend ever in early August, and the busiest week on record at the end of the month, with 250,291 flights and a daily average of 35,756.
Crucially, this surge in traffic was accompanied by a sharp improvement in performance: the average ATFM delays felt from 5.4 to 3.9 minutes per flight, with en-route delays returning to 2019 levels (3.1 minutes per flight). This progress reflects targeted measures implemented by Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs), in particular optimising the rostering of Air Traffic Controllers (ATCOs) and a stronger European coordination focusing on proactive weather management, where EUROCONTROL’s network actions proved decisive.
Yet the system is still running at the edge of its structural capacity. ATCOs shortages, persistent capacity bottlenecks, and delayed technological deployments continue to limit scalability and undermine resilience. This summer shows that operational fixes can buy time, but they cannot secure the future. Only sustained investment and a full execution of the ATM Master Plan, including the phased roll-out of the Digital European Sky, will deliver a scalable, sustainable, and seamlessly digital system that serves both crewed and uncrewed aviation in the future.
Many SESAR solutions defined and validated within the homonymous EU co-funded programme, are now being rolled out with implementation rates reaching 83% for Phase A, 61% for Phase B, and 13% for Phase C of the Master Plan. Whilst the deployment process is underway, the pace of change is below the levels initially envisaged, and the scale of investment required remains substantial, with funding needs exceeding €20 billion under the current roadmap.
To complete the planned roll-out, an estimated €1.2 billion will be needed to finalise Phases A and B by 2027, i.e. under the current Common Project 1. Phase C requires a further €11.4 billion investment overall by 2035, alongside €3.7 billion to implement the new Service Delivery Model. Looking further ahead, €9.2 billion will be needed for Phase D between 2035 and 2045.
These investment figures smash with the reality, as looking at the period 2020-2024 (i.e. Reference Period 3 of the performance and charging scheme regulation) the ANSPs of the Single European Sky (SES) Area planned an aggregated investment of 5.3B€, but then almost halved the actual average yearly expenditure for Common Projects, with respect to previous Reference Period 2 (2015-2019 see ACE Benchmarking Report 2025 Edition). Many ANSPs have not implemented their ATCOs and investment plans and have not achieved their capacity targets, according to the analysis of the Performance Review Body of the EU Commission.
When looking at the financial strength of ANSPs across EUROCONTROL Members —including all 42 EUROCONTROL Members, with the exemption of Cyprus, Greece, Luxembourg, Monaco and Montenegro due to unavailability of data—(ANSP Financial Dashboard), it appears clear that ANSPs are facing a significant depletion of their cash reserves, which have halved since 2019, as shown in figure. This depletion has been driven by large ANSPs, whose reserves dropped by almost 75% since 2019. Cash reserves for small ANSPs reduced by a 24% in the same period, while medium ANSPs have recovered their pre-pandemic reserve levels.
At the same time, ANPS’s CAPEX investments have been sustained in the ±2% band (with respect to 2023 non-current assets), meaning that ANSPs are consuming their cash reserves, while only being able to maintain the existing infrastructure. This is the case for most EUROCONTROL Members, with the exception of ENAIRE in Spain, DFS in France and DHMI in Turkey, which have been increasingly expanding its ground infrastructure.
This stagnation of Net Book Value per se is not necessarily a warning sign, as the ATM trend is to rationalize the infrastructure and implement cost-efficiency measures. Hence, maintaining infrastructure levels in a growth scenario implies leveraging on scale to provide a more efficient service.
Nonetheless, if read in combination with the reduction of cash reserves and the financial stress hitting pan-European ANSPs, as seen in figure (i.e. negative profitability sustained for the past 8 years and leading to a significant cumulative loss-making), it means that these ANSPs have in general low financial capacity to face the forthcoming investments as foreseen in the EU ATM Master Plan, recurring to considerably higher debt than in the past, while showing fragility against any new drop in air traffic demand due to external shocks that may determine a declining in revenues.
This requires special attention when (re)designing the Performance and Charging Scheme in view of the next Reference Period 5 (RP5) of the EU system. There is a significant challenge to ensure the sustainability of the system and its resilience, as ANSPs not only have to make front to important investments in the next years but also require a balance in building their reserves, to ensure business continuity in a highly regulated environment. This will require:
- A sound and targeted investment planning, clearly relating CAPEX with tangible capacity improvements.
- The introduction of innovative financial regulatory measures, incentivising the consistent implementation of digital solutions in line with Master Plan and Common Projects.
- The activation of credit lines and preferential funding, involving the right mix of EU grants, multilateral institutions and commercial credit institutes into the financing of the Digital European Sky infrastructure.
- The coordinated and holistic management of digital transformation, ensuring the efficient hiring and training of personnel, in line with the new digital skills required by digital solutions and advanced automation.
The digital transformation of Europe’s Air Traffic Management system demands innovative policy tools, top-tier technical expertise, bold leadership and substantial coordinated investments. With the right mix of these measures, Europe can turn this historic challenge into a unique opportunity to create the world’s most efficient and environmentally friendly airspace.
About the authors
Mario Cano
BSc in Aeronautical Engineering, MSc in Astronautics and Space Engineering, and MSc in Aerospace Engineering. Executive MBA from IESE. Senior Engagement Manager at ALG specializing in ATM and Space.
Álvaro Fernández
BSc in Aeronautical Engineering, MSc in Air Traffic Operations Management from ENAC, Toulouse. Consultant at ALG specializing in ATM.
