Aer Lingus - 6

[DublinPole]

In other words, Ryanair could cut all routes from Ireland tomorrow and still be a fairly well functioning airline,

So the fact that a business is successful in more than one country is a bad thing and we should be deeply disgusted by such fact and we should praise companies who only have success in their own market.

I don't know how much business that has been studied by people reading this board, but I'd have thought that being active in more markets so you don't place your eggs in one basket is a shrewd business move.

Aer Lingus tried to expand into Gatwick and failed, but neverless, because they failed this makes them good, but because Ryanair succeeded this makes them bad.

[Aerlingus231]

So the fact that a business is successful in more than one country is a bad thing and we should be deeply disgusted by such fact and we should praise companies who only have success in their own market.

I never said it was a bad thing, it's a great thing that we have two of the most profitable airlines in Europe, What I was simply saying was that Ryanair was not as dependent on Ireland as much as Aer Lingus was.

[Shamrock350]

Aer Lingus tried to expand into Gatwick and failed, but neverless, because they failed this makes them good, but because Ryanair succeeded this makes them bad.

You have completely misinterpreted what people have said. Nowhere has it been said that Ryanair's success outside of Ireland is a bad thing, it's very clear that almost everyone respects Ryanair for its success and the fact a small Irish airline is now one of the worlds largest.

The discussion of Ryanair and its Irish operations cropped up when a comparison with Aer Lingus was made with regard to the take over attempt and the profitability of the two carriers. While Aer Lingus is profitable purely because of its core Irish operation, Ryanair is not and its profits come from across the European network. This means a fair comparison of both airlines profitability within the Irish market (the market that the take over mainly covers) is difficult as Ryanair does not divulge in details of which part of the network makes the most/least money.

[BALHR]

BA are just sitting on those slots, mark my words within the next 18-24 months BA will certainly be out of DUB and most likely out of BHD as well.

Agreed, they are sitting in slots right now until they get more long-haul planes, but if they did not find the Ex-BMI routes to BHD/DUB profitable, it would have withdrawn them from those routes like they have done with Khartoum and Amritsar

But they have not done that, also you also have to note that LHR-DUB is the 3rd busiest route out of LHR and if they do get EI’s LHR slots, then they would have to state it will continue to run LHR-IRE even after integration (to please the relevant authorities)

Agreed BA have already gone from 8 announced to Dublin, only ever got to 7 and now down to 5 from S13

Easy and FLYBE do not fly to Ireland , they are domestic operators to BFS BHD...Easy did try once but were chased off by FR pretty well overnight , and that same scenario will happen again once FR get EI, the alleged replacemnt carriers will get a free run for a while , maybe even a season then they will be undercut and scheule matched until they leave, as in GO BUZZ and currently Whizz on CorkPoland

BA will never make money shorthaul and they just need feed for Longhaul ex ireland ,,,, thats the bit outside the UK, ....

BUT

Any brief look at Longhaul ex IRELAND tells you ba are finsihed,

Emirates Etihad and now Turkish have taken the longhaul traffic South and East and the 10-14 flights a day westbound to USA take that longhaul slice.

When BA left Ireland 20 years ago they had a Longhaul product ex IRELAND

However its moved now to the new hubs , new planes, lower fare, less termianl swaps etc.

IRELAND is tiny but supports Etihad x10 a week to go 12 from S13, 6x777 and 6x330
Emirates 777 X7 a week soon to go 14 daily
Turkish daily soon to go 10 a week 737-900

Ba will re visit code share with EI in IRELAND , not sure about domestic UK BHD MAN ABZ EDI but deffinitley IRELAND

But their feed has gone, maybe they dont need it as certainly their capapcity cut backs reflect this.

Easyjet and Flybe do fly to Ireland, only its the Northern Ireland bit...

LHR-DUB is the 3rd busiest out of LHR and the busiest out of DUB, also if BA felt that it is not good for the business to serve Ireland, they would have withdrawn the routes as soon as they intergrated BMI into BA

Remember if EI withdrew from LHR-DUB/BHD, then there would be higher demand on BA’s sevices (if codeshared by EI) and if done right, higher yields as well

BALHR, you need to understand that particularly in the case of domestic routes, BA has had to convince competition authority that they will support the regions of the UK and whether they wanted to do Belfast or not, they have to show that their take over of bmi will not be detrimental to domestic flying, similar reason why they have launched LBA LHR, a route that bmi axed years ago in favour of longer routes.

BA in Dublin, 8 a day from the outset was ambitious. Clearly slot holding. I dont see BA long term in DUB, though they will watch with interest what the outcome of FR takeover of EI is on that one.

So like their takeover of BMI, BA would have to convince the same authorities that it will continue to operate LHR-DUB/BHD for some time after the purchasing EI’s LHR slots

Remember, no government authority can force an airline to do a route that is unprofitable, we have moved on from this…

BA is the sort of airline that only operates routes if they are profitable (or in the case of connecting routes, contribute to profitable routes)

The reason why they launched LHR-LBA was that there was enough (and the right) demand to make the route work in terms of connections (other BA would not launch the route) and with the purchase of BMI, they had enough slots to launch the service (the lack of slots at LHR meant BA and other airlines cancelled smaller domestic routes in favour of medium/long-haul routes)

As for the future of LHR-DUB/BHD, well there is enough demand for those routes, but the question is are they profitable or do they contribute to profitable routes?

Who is 'we', I think readers in general with an interest in Ireland or UK aviation read this they understood the writer meant Ireland meaning the Republic of Ireland as most would know that easyJet do fly to Northern Ireland already.

What I have stated is that I count (for the purposes of aviation) Northern Ireland AND the Republic of Ireland as “Ireland” when referred to in this forum
Doe’s anybody have any disagreements with that?

In fact, I understand that the reason there are 4 LHR slot pairs excluded from the "agreement" is that these slots don't actually belong to EI - they are leased to EI by VS and are presently used to cover the 3x daily SNN-LHR and one of the daily DUB-LHR routings. As such, the assumption is that they will be returned to VS at some point in time.

To solve “competition concerns” maybe FR (via EI) could offer to operate LHR-DUB 4 X Daily on behalf of VS using those slots, that’s if DL allow VS to do so (not likely…)

FR will not be doing a deal with anybody, the relevant competition bodies will decide and any deal to sell EI to FR will most likely include some form of ringfencing of LHR Slots. Assuming FR are given approval, seems most unlikely.

The 4 slots pair not included in this deal (leased from VS) could be used to allow VS (or another operator) to operate LHR-DUB to fix any competition concerns (not that there are any)
If FR will not get approval to buy EI, then they will try again…
What else does FR need to do to get approval (they have already agreed to give the EI LHR slots and will hand over slots in relation to other UK-IRE routes to another airline?

Not entirely true, the issues are quite recent. EI had added codesharing on BFS LHR before bmi deal was done. Leaving one world not a big issue between EI / BA. There relationship really only come under the spot light an appears strained since bmi purchase.

This will sort itself out in time. Too much at stake for both parties, particularly BA.

This is another reason why I feel BA will still operate at least some kind of service to Ireland, if they felt operating the Ex-BMI routes to LHR-BHD/DUB was not worth straining their relationship with their close partner EI, then why are they still operating it?

I still think however that IAG should be the “white knight” and at the very least buy both the stakes held by the Irish Government and Ryanair (to make better use of the LHR slots and the potential deeper links)

What??? Did you just suggest that EI, a profitable company, should sell some of their most valuable assets to another company, so that the other company can make a profit at EI's expense? EI makes a profit on LHR, if it didn't then sure they could consider selling them, but what kind of mad hatter idea is it to sell something making you money, so that your competition can make money on it instead???

They can still codeshare on BA’s Irish routes (LHR-DUB/BHD), they can make money without the costs of operating the routes, plus they can make further money (a lot at current rates) by selling the LHR slots in the first place

Remember also that BA is not “competition” for EI, but a relativity close partner for quite some time now

The bigger question here is that there is simply that there is there is a lack of space at LHR, this is hampering the BA + VS/LHR/London/England/UK from competing with its rivals and contributing to the economy, until that changes, users of LHR need to make some hard choices, for example do we need to cut frequency to the bare minimum that makes to work (like LHR-DUB) and which carriers can use LHR and which cannot (not though legal means, but though market forces)
We would not be having this problem is there where 4 runways at LHR…

[BALHR]

What I want to know in relation to a possible FR takeover of EI is (either what FR plans to do or what we think will happen):

Will the Aer Lingus branding/operation be retained?

Will the A319/A320/A321 fleet be withdrawn?

What happens to Aer Lingus Regional?

Will FR/EI continue to operate TATL routes?

If they do continue TATL operations, will they be under the Aer Lingus brand or the “Ryan Atlantic” brand (which has been suggested as a TATL LCC airline liked to FR)?

Which routes will be withdrawn by a combined FR/EI?

What will happen to the EI BHD hub (which FR withdrew from some time ago)?

What will happen to the VS LHR-MAN/EDI/ABZ (if DL allows VS to keep them) operated by EI?

What will happen in terms of union representation at a combined FR/EI (EI allows unions, FR does not)?

Will the current FR management team remain, or will at least some of EI’s management team be retained?

What routes could FR launch if they got a bigger number of slots at Dublin, Shannon and Cork (by buying EI)?

How will this effect the use of the T1 and T2 at DUB (Will T2 have to be expanded and modified to meet the needs of FR/EI, for example)?

Lastly, can a FR/EI merger work?

[BALHR]

I cannot agree that BA already compete on IRISH routes

No service to CORK , only FR and EI
No service to SNN only FR and EI
No service to KIR only FR
No service to NOC only FR and EI

and the domestice legs

No service to LDY only FR

Service to BHD competes with EI BE EZYamong others but no FR

BA are cutting back on service to DUB , after less than a year , and never delivered on the promised 8 a day to BHD as yet anyway

What I meant was that BA operates againt FR on LON-DUB, I did not state any other route

Something just tells me BA will take any slots they can from IRELAND or Domestic UK and switch them toLonghaul when they get the planes

No one (and myself) is suggesting anything otherwise...

I think there is more chance of FR buying IAG , for cash , than there is of EI selling BA their slots for BA to divert these slots away from IRELAND or Domestic UK ,

FR is only interested (apart from EI) in buying LH (which includes LX, OS and SN)!

http://theairlineblog.********.co.uk...lufthansa.html

But who knows MOL always has a plan and he sure wants to expand and has the cash for IAG which is not performing well at all ......

BA is doing fine, its IB thats the porblem...

The Minister for Transport has just announced formally that the government will not be selling its 25% share in Aer Lingus to Ryanair.

Despite the fact they are having to cut spending (thanks to the EU)?

and Ryanair made an offer they could not refuse...

If cleared by EU they could still buy 75% but unlikely staff will sell their share either. The govt have announced they will appoint advisors in the new year so perhaps someone else will buy it. Who knows Ryanair may then try to buy that entity!

Could they buyout all other shareholds bar the government and staff (which would give then a majority stake) and force the airline to close and transfer its assets to the "new" EI (100% owned by FR)

Or they could offer both parties a better deal

Or EI could buy back FR stake and raise money for it by selling their LHR/LGW slots

I just get the impression that a transformational move is coming for EI, I'm not sure what but whoever buys the govt. stake will give an indication. I know WW has said IAG aren't interested but the pension issue will have to be sorted before any sale and with such slots at LHR would IAG not be missing out big time not to go after it.

IAG should have a look at buying a shareholding in EI, to protect it from a FR takeover and have deeper ties with the airline

EI will look to make a purchase of annother carrier , they have to grow

I doubt they need to do that...

BA have lost the feed traffic no matter who they choose to code share with and I still think they will come back to EI and re visit the code share as they need those DUBLHR and BHDLHR slots to fly to all those places in CHINA and India with unpronouncable names.

Without a doubt, but thw question of BA leaving Ireland altogether is another matter...

EI are currently well run and VERY succesful but a small player.

True, they have a better chance of surrvival than most carriers of its size in Europe

Intersting times but its great that such a tiny wee ISLAND has two profitable shothaul carriers in these tough times , and maybe even RE and WX will get going again ,

CityJet (which is barely has any operations in Ireland, is mostly based at LCY/CDG, is owned by the French-Dutch and is now partly Belgium as well) has not much of a future...

Aer Arran is now is now nothing more than an affilate of EI, in terms of its operations

I would hesitate to call FR and irish airline for the purposes of this discussion. FR flies a large multitude of routes across Europe and makes no reference to the profitability of individual routes. While FR is an Irish company, its reach stretches far beyond the island, although IRL-UK routes are thought to be some of the most profitable in the netowrk. By the same token cityJet has a very small presence in the Irish market. You could argue that FR and WX are profitable in spite of their Irish operations, rather than because of them.

Unlike CityJet, FR has large operations at Dublin, Cork and Shannon, so you could call it a Irish Airline, but most of their operations come outside of Ireland

In other words, its the Guiness of the avation world

They also have the "harp" symbol on their planes and the Irish flag next to their reg

To me it looks as if the Irish Government has made this decision on purely political grounds, probably connected with the Irish trade unions. The EI share price is well below the FR offer price. The share price will probably now collapse and those poor staff in the company bought into the company at privatisation will have lost all their investments. EI is going nowhere, has an appaling balance sheet when the pension liabilities are included and every development plan they have followed has failed. It looks as if they are heading for that giant airline scrapheap in the sky.

True, is purely poltical, I am surpised they can even do this considering they have had a bailout and are cutting spending...

But Remember, with the exception of FR all of Europes airlines have a dismal share price/market cap, mainly due to the costs and the state of the industry

They have also had to deal with the one of the worst ecnomic downturns in Irish history and they have face strong competition from FR and have made some bad mistakes (like their now closed base in LGW)

Despite this, they are in a better shape then most Medium/Small European airlines (like IB for example) and are still making profits

If they are to enter the great scrapheap of the sky (home to airlines sch as PA and now BD), it will more likely be due to a FR takeover and not BK

Remember, A Ex-AA CEO once said:

"I don't invest in airlines. And I always said to the employees of American, This is not an appropriate investment. It's a great place to work and it's a great company that does important work. But airlines are not an investment"

The same goes for pretty much every single airline in the business, maybe excepting EK and FR (and a few others...), but they are a very small (and lucky) number

[BALHR]

That's a risk any investor takes. You're assuming AL will go bankrupt. Based on the profitable nature of the business that seems to be a small risk, though, like any firm, the risk exists. The staff are more likely to be happy to see the back of mick as the scenario of him winning offered the cast-iron guarantee of being fired. A small risk of AL going bankrupt vs the 100% chance of being fired... I think the desired outcome has been reached.

If FR takes over EI, you can also be sure that EI employees will lose union representation and suffer from worse pay and condtions than what they currently have...

Remember the IRL-UK market (largely DUB market) has changed a lot since 2006/7 and routes once profitable are now heavily loss making.

Why are FR will operating them then?

Imagine that somehow FR gets the green light to take over EI. BA gets the lion's share of the Heathrow slots and flyBE takes on 20 routes out of Ireland (including, incidentally, some longer sectors that really need 150+ seaters rather than E195s). What happens three years down the road? BA shifts most of the Heathrow slots over to more lucrative long-haul, and FR goes after flyBE with aggressive pricing and chases it off most or all of the 20 Irish routes, just as it's doing with Wizz in Cork. Result: the Irish market is then a Ryanair near-monopoly. But consumers should rejoice because "Irish aviation is even stronger"? Tell me again how exactly?

BA will still have less (in proportion and in overall number) than LH in FRA/MUC/ZRH and AF/KL in AMS and CDG even after buying EI's slos

If the Irish market becomes a FR-monopoly and then raises fares, then maybe BA/BA CF (after buying WX) could then cut raise the stakes in the competition on LON-DUB (FR are not interested in LHR-NHD)

Could Flybe least some A320s off BA for the irsh routes then?

[Aerlingus231]

BA Agenda Much?

They can still codeshare on BA’s Irish routes (LHR-DUB/BHD), they can make money without the costs of operating the routes, plus they can make further money (a lot at current rates) by selling the LHR slots in the first place

Remember also that BA is not “competition” for EI, but a relativity close partner for quite some time now

The bigger question here is that there is simply that there is there is a lack of space at LHR, this is hampering the BA + VS/LHR/London/England/UK from competing with its rivals and contributing to the economy,

What kind of BA agenda are you pushing here? Don't you realise how ridiculous you sound?
If EI are operating the flights, and not BA, then they're the one's making the profit, why would they give away a profit making route to BA?

Also, the fact that BA can't expand from LHR to compete with the likes of EK, EY and TK is absolutely none of EI's concern, they don't owe BA these slots out of sheer good will. What in gods name makes you think that EI would give away it's biggest route to the competition, just so that their competition can compete better? That's just nonsense and makes absolutely no sense on the part of EI.

[Aerlingus231]

and Ryanair made an offer they could not refuse...

Clearly they didn't make an offer they couldn't refuse, because the Government refused, and rightly so, one of their best decisions in recent months.

Or EI could buy back FR stake and raise money for it by selling their LHR/LGW slots

Seriously, what is it with you and EI selling their slots???

[isayoldchap]

Aerlingus231, you just beat me to it. Either BALHR has too much time on his or her hands at home or there is some other ulterior motive to the reams of drivel just posted.

[BALHR]

Granted, they have a UK holding company under which UK workers are employed,
but the majority of their staff are on Irish contracts and pay Irish taxes. The
point still stands, Ryanair is as Irish if not more so than Aer Lingus who also
have a UK holding company and employ UK workers under UK contracts (and yet
nobody is arguing Aer Lingus aren't Irish...).

It's just typically Irish
that we have a company that is a world leader in their industry (one of a few
such Irish companies) and one of the biggest airlines in the world, which we
should proud of and yet some people don't even consider them Irish. And then we
turn around and welcome the US multinationals with open arms as if they
are Irish companies.

Ironicly, Guinness is owned by a British Company and the company itself has been based in the UK since 1932

[pwalhx]

BA you are beginning to make yourself look foolish here. Granted it is obvious you have a great desire for BA to flourish and that is your choice, but justifying this by suggestion they buy, do deals or sell out to Virgin, Ryanair or anyone else is not going to happen.

Lets be honest does BA need to operate as many flights as it does to JFK every day, no, so if it really thought it could make more money using those slots elsewhere it would, there are resources available within if it needs to.

[Skipness One Echo]

What kind of BA agenda are you pushing here? Don't you realise how ridiculous you sound?

This chap has no relation with BA, believe me, he's a 21 year old college student fan boy. He is the one and only person on my ignore list as he has taken to writing 2000-3000 word posts at a time on some of the other previously interesting threads.

This is an interesting time for Aer Lingus though as their nemesis has just taken their last new aircraft on order and so is about to undergo something of a step change in cost base. Also with no prospect of ownership, would be expecting FR to bail out as soon as possible?

[VanBosh]

My fear is that if EI is off the cards, they may attack. Saying that EI are doing well against FR as shown by the doubling of services to BHX

[dublinaviator]

@BALHR, you've clearly got a lot of enthusiasm in your posts but would you stop posting these thesis long replies, because nobody can respond to them and you're just killing the debate/discussion on here.

I will say one thing though, Guinness might be owned by Diageo but it's still Irish and has probably contributed more to this country than any other company in the history of the state.

[clareview]

Several posts back BALHR said he regards Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland as "Ireland". He then asks does anybody disagree. I certainly do as factually he is wrong. The Republic of Ireland is a country in its own right. Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdon of Great Britian and Northern Ireland so it cannot be acurately referred to as Ireland.

[EI-BUD]

Several posts back BALHR said he regards Northern Ireland and the Republic of
Ireland as "Ireland". He then asks does anybody disagree. I certainly do as
factually he is wrong. The Republic of Ireland is a country in its own right.
Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdon of Great Britian and Northern
Ireland so it cannot be acurately referred to as Ireland.

This is an aviation forum, do we need to get into Ireland UK debate again? Can we stick to the topics in hand i.e. Aer Lingus in this instance, nobody needs a history or a geography, and besides the people on this thread and any of the NI related threads are able to put politics aside and not need to define what who or where we live as it is again not related to this forum as it usually created division disagreement etc.

Merry Christmas to one and all.

[Aerlingus231]

I think purely from an understanding and interpretation point of view if someone says Ireland the immediate thought is the Republic and the republic only, you'd have to say "The Island of Ireland" or something of that sort to get people to think about it that way. That's just the way people understand it. Also for some points it's good to differenciate between the two.

[EI-BUD]

@BALHR, you've clearly got a lot of enthusiasm in your posts but would you
stop posting these thesis long replies, because nobody can respond to them and
you're just killing the debate/discussion on here.

Yes I agree with this, total drivel most of the time, just posting random stuff, often totally overlooking commentary from other people. Clearly the writer has had his/her first inspiration from the aviation world and wants to keep a diary of it on here.. puts some people right off and I for one totally disengage from the message when it is reems of rubbish, which usually needs correction.

[dublinaviator]

Originally Posted by clareview

Several posts back BALHR said he regards Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland as "Ireland". He then asks does anybody disagree. I certainly do as factually he is wrong. The Republic of Ireland is a country in its own right. Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdon of Great Britian and Northern Ireland so it cannot be acurately referred to as Ireland.

He's not really as Ireland is both an island and a state. So saying Northern Ireland is part of Ireland is technically correct.

Also, the Republic of Ireland doesn't exist. The name of this country is Ireland. Though you'd be forgiven for thinking otherwise given the ignorance of the BBC who refuse to refer to this country by it's official and internationally recognised name.

I agree with Aerlingus231 though, if people want to refer to the whole island just say 'island of Ireland' to avoid any confusion/offence.