It may be that with BA's pensions liability included, BA will be the minority shareholder in the merged controlling company. This despite BA being by far the more significant airline of the 2 thanks to its global, if shrunken , network. Its obsession with a merger - is difficult to understand and has never been explained to shareholders . Iberia with its long standing service quality and industrial relations baggage doesnt appear to bring much to the party. A glance at the map shows that it is in the wrong place for any kind of a hub other than to South America, which is of little real value to the UK market. BAs missed and probably only valuable opportunity (twice ) was KLM and having missed that and seen KLM go off with Air France ,it has been obsessively scrambling for a partner ever since. Lufthansa in contrast has used its strength and gone for purchase of smaller airlines (Austrian) and setting up useful subsidiaries (Lufthansa Italia) to break into other markets. BA for some time does not seem to have understood its potential to go it alone and lacks confidence to do so.