http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=307833
Just in case there are people who do not read other D & G threads, there is the link to the discussion about Lion Air Australia. As you see, at the start of the discussion everyone was asking who is the Australian partner, by the end of the first day it was revealed as SkyAirWorld. A joint venture with SAW holding 51% and Lion Air 49%. The airline will do some Australian domestic flying, and some flying between Australia and Indonesia. The guy from Lion Air said he wants to set up these venture all around Asia - the next one will be Thailand. He has orders for 122 737-900ERs, and he needs to place the planes somewhere.
So, I asked our own NZ thread, if he wants to set up ventures all over the place, why not NZ?
These 739s can seat 215 passengers and fly upto 3200 miles, so you would not use them for NZ domestic, not even AKL-WLG. If Pakeha-Boy would be interested in doing a fly over at Warbirds over Wanaka in a 739, by all means.
These are Trans Tasman out of NZ. Trans Tasman could be done by the Australian operation, but it suits PacificBlue and Jetstar to have Trans Tasman operated out of CHC, so LionNZ would have the same advantage. You might have planes rotating through the Australian base for periodic maintenance, or even better, have the Australian planes come to NZ for their checks.
LionNZ and Lion Australia can offer joint fares so that Kiwis can go to Asia for holidays, and people from Asia can come to the South Island for ski holidays - better value than ski holidays at any Australian ski resorts.
A joint venture like this is really a franchise - you use some of the ideas of an overseas company. This is Lion. Could be Air Asia NZ. Any time Pakeha-Boy would like to come home to be Chief Pilot for Skybus NZ, just say.