All this talk of flybe getting a foot in the door in Europe by buying a foreign airline is getting people giddy. Let's calm down a moment and look at some of the past attempts and learn from them.
BA buying (any old
)TAT to get a foothold in France, going to be the next big thing and grow the business. Lost millions.
BA buying Delta Air to get a foothold in Germany after the end of the IGS services from Berlin, making it into Deutsche BA. Lost millions and what was left was sold.
easyJet buying TEA Basle intending to get a foothold in the Swiss market. Stelio is on record as saying it was a bad move and would have made much more sense in just setting up a new airlines and starting from scratch.
This is the key. There is nothing stopping flybe operating as Ryanair do, opening bases right across Europe. Quite why this needs to involve buying out a company with a different culture, business model and then get involved in merging seniority lists I do not know. Cross border airline sales can work but the best examples so far have kept their own identity and have have similar businss models and alliances. Think Air France / KLM, Lufthansa / Austrian / bmi / Swiss and now BA / Iberia.
I think Skippy's patented Airliners.net Magical Dartboard of Acquisition and Route Planning has arrived on pprune! Woe I Say! ( Whoa surely! Ed )