GOL targets growth over next two years after emerging from Chapter 11
March 4, 2026
Brazilian airline GOL is targeting an ambitious growth plan over the next two years after emerging from Chapter 11 restructuring, its CEO has said.
Speaking during the Routes Americas 2026 conference in Rio de Janeiro, Celso Ferrer said that the carrier was looking to expand international routes beyond its traditional markets, providing connectivity in a region that has been slower to switch from land to air transport.
GOL goes for growth
Celso said the carrier was seeking to benefit from a “new wave of growth” in the Latin American market.
“The potential is enormous,” he said, before adding that economic constraints in the country, such as low wages, were the primary factor acting as a drag on the number of people choosing to fly.
GOL’s route expansion plans are impressive. Among the new international connections being launched is Asunción in Paraguay to Miami, the only nonstop flight between the cities and the longest route operated by a Boeing 737 MAX anywhere in the world.
Elsewhere, GOL has recently added a new domestic connection, Manaus–Fortaleza, as well as Miami to Belem in the Amazon region last year.
“We are trying to open routes that either nobody’s trying or connecting two cities in a different way,” Celso said, giving the burgeoning Argentina-Brazil tourism market as one example.
“We have been deploying a lot of capacity from Buenos Aires to many cities in Brazil. We see all the airlines now copying this, which is good. We want to be the first movers. Competition is welcome. It shows that our team had a good case.”
Fleet plans for Brazilian low cost carrier GOL
GOL operates a fleet of Boeing 737 aircraft, both the NG and MAX variants. It has a total of 147 737s, 12 of which are parked. This includes 58 737 MAX-8s.
There have been rumours of a move to take on widebodies, and reports suggest that GOL has placed a reservation for aircraft registrations linked to all of fellow Brazilian carrier Azul’s Airbus A330neo widebodies.
Airbus A330s would align with the wider fleet of parent company Abra Group, which has investments in Avianca, GOL, and Wamos.
Commenting on the possible expansion of the fleet, Celso, himself a 737 pilot, hinted at a new aircraft type, but insisted the priority would be tackling the costs and complexities of introducing a new aircraft type.
“We are looking for a broader perspective and we are looking for market opportunities no matter where they are,” he said.
“If there is an opportunity to launch a new [aircraft] type in Brazil to explore XYZ market, we are going to do it, and we are going to try to leverage as much as we can the whole supply chain, the whole service, maintenance inside of the group and use the plane with GOL pilots or Avianca pilots or Wamos pilots in a smart way to make sure that we can capture the potential demand without the risk of a new aircraft type to a company like us. That’s exactly the discussion we are having now.”
GOL’s post-Chapter 11 turnaround
The airline, headquartered in Rio de Janeiro and with its main hub in São Paulo, completed financial restructuring last summer.
“I’m in a different company now, because we were able to raise all the money to go through the chapter 11 on day one,” the CEO added. “And that helped a lot.”
Celso said GOL had reshaped the Brazilian airline industry, having grown its market share considerably to around 30 million annual passengers. “We are all excited, we know the potential,” Celso concluded.
“And as Brazilians, we say that Brazil is the country of tomorrow, but tomorrow never comes. We all see that Brazil still has very low penetration in terms of aviation. But my view is that we are starting to see a new wave of growth.”
Featured image: Nathan Coats / Wikimedia Commons
