This publication discuss and apply strong scientific, theoretical and empirical notions, frameworks and models in the airline industry. We analyze the industry from an internal potential where we derive the competitiveness of Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) and match this towards the market requirement and industry development. These micro and meso economic levels are discussed compared to the current and future macro economic development since the aviation industry and the national accounts share store positive correlations. We derive the internal potential by assessing SAS through frameworks such as "The Resource Based View", "Core Competences" and "Dynamic Capabilities". These notions are compared to the industry analysis based on "Porter's 5 Forces". This is also compared to the macroeconomic context by a PEST analysis. Due to the importance of alliances and global networks within aviation we have also applied valuable notions from alliance and network theory. In short, weconnect the internal potential with the market opportunities and the macroeconomic setting. This is done in order to assess as firms "competitiveness", which is the core of our framework.