Originally Posted by
WHBM
OK, being wholly positive about the BMI merger, what is going to be done with it ?
There may be some fine detail about keeping services on the BMI licences to comply with slot rights, route licences, ownership by IAG and not BA, etc, but the overall image presented will be BA.
BA would appear to be back in the Middle East to all the points that went with B Med (whose cold-shouldering in the first place must surely be seen as a mistake), and indeed back to Belfast. I hope they hang on to them all. The trunk Scotland routes are still capable of pulling in a great deal of revenue, as has been found after BMI gave up Glasgow, and could do with a good recast.
All the moaners seem to go on about "only for the slots", so what might these additional slots actually be used for ? There is the sudden opportunity to do a big network recast that has not been possible for years, so what shall we do with them ?
Well, according to a story on the Guardian site
here,
Willie Walsh, IAG chief executive, rejected concerns that the deal will put a fares squeeze on consumers as he promised to use bmi's takeoff and landing slots as bridgeheads to cities in China, Korea, Vietnam and Indonesia. The Asia-Pacific region has become the financial powerhouse of the aviation industry but Walsh and Heathrow owner BAA have long complained that the airport's growth constraints are preventing the development of new routes.
"We don't fly to places like Korea, Indonesia, Vietnam. There are a lot of destinations in Asia that are booming," he said, adding that building links with Asian cities was "absolutely critical" for the UK economy and IAG's long-haul business. "The potential growth in Asia is way in excess of anything we will see around Europe."
And to think about slots for a moment (but hopefully in a non-moaning way
) I would imagine that the competition authorities will require divestment of slots to enable competition on existing competed routes (e.g. Moscow, which Virgin might like, and Manchester and Edinburgh, which...hmm, who knows? Business Air Mk 2 for the latter?).
And what about DUB-LHR? Currently of course BA codeshares with EI for connecting traffic, so bmi provides the only effective competition. Unless BA starts their own DUB-LHR (unlikely), there is a Significant Lessening of Competition as a result of the deal. Could we see a slot divestment ordered for this route too?