ThomsonFly/Hapag Lloyd Express to be sold?

[airhumberside]

http://www.forbes.com/business/feeds/afx/2005/05/11/afx2016828.html

Investors will call on TUI AG at the company's annual general meeting today to rid itself of its no-frills airlines Hapag-Lloyd Express and Thomsonfly, according to a report in Handelsblatt newspaper.

Fund manager Michael Griese of Union Investment Group told the newspaper that the two airlines are not profitable in the long term.

TUI chief financial officer Rainer Feuerhake said earlier he expects the company's no-frills airline Hapag-Lloyd Express (HLX) to achieve a profit this year, while airline Thomsonfly is seen achieving a profit in 2006.

Union Investment Group said it owns more than 8 mln shares worth 150 mln eur of the German tourism giant.

[yeoman]

So they own a lot of shares. Why not sell if they are unhappy? Profit before peoples livelihoods. Twas ever thus.:mad:

[Lite]

With regards to Hapag Lloyd Express, I am sure that the enter Boeing 737-700 & Fokker 100 fleet are wetleased from Germania Flug, so these aircraft and their crews would simply be deployed to another operation. Where this is not the case, I imagine that they will simply be reintergrated into Hapagfly.

Similar situation with Thomsonfly. The airline already uses Britannia's AOC, aircraft & office facilities, it makes sense to use the strong brand that has now been grown out of CVT/BOH/DSA areas in the no-frills market, to use this new name to cater for the growing dot commers travel market!

[Nakata77]

this is the biggest load of b"*locks I've read in ages. Britannia have only just changed thier enitre name and fleet to Thomsonfly.com. They are not now going to seperate it and sell it off! HLX, maybe! Not Thomsonfly.

What would be the benefit of spending £55m starting an airline up, burning a further £75m expanding it only to sell it off at £100m.

TUI want the charter and LCC markets to merge and will not sacrifice the thousands of seats already on sale for summer 2006 through TOM flights from TUI customers.

I know TUI have lost £143 in the first 3 months, but the LCC arm is what will save it in the long term.

[Centre cities]

What appears to make sense and what happens are not always the same thing.

A change of policy and focus at the top and it dosnt matter what has happened before.

Happens all the time in industry, large company groups selling part of the business as it does not fit into the core operation.


Centre cities

[ric180880]

TUI are just in the middle of intergrating Britannia/Thomsonfly even more into TUI UK (what was Thomson Holidays). During the coming months Thomson Head Office will be moving to the Britannia ones at LTN and departments such as HR are to be intergrated and serve the whole of the TUI UK organisation, including the old Lunn Poly business, now Thomson Holiday Shops. TUI are not going to sell off Thomsonfly.

[Speedtape]

I wouldn't hold your breath hoping it wont happen. At a company briefing today, this very subject arose;)

[bmibaby.com]

Personally, I think its more likely that the airline will intergrate the operations of the no-frills airlines back into the mainline, holiday carriers.

Hapagfly & Thomsonfly (BY) are both feeling the bite of the no-frills carriers, and rather than doing the typical knee-jerk reaction of launching a "me too" carrier, they are both beginning to offer seat-only flights on their holiday routes, and need to being having a cost structure, schedule (more than once weekly) & advertising to match their new no-frills rivals.

HLX & Thomsonfly (TOM) only distract the public away from the main brand, and whilst it does mean some pax are clawed back from flying with another LCC, these passengers really ought to be flying with the mainline carrier.

As has already been mentioned, little would be lost through merging the airlines back into mainline. HLX & Thomsonfly lease their aircraft & crews from the mainline carriers (HLX also get six Boeing 737-700s & flight deck crews from Germania - those 73Gs previously being used on thinner TUI routes in Germany/Austria) so these aircraft could come back to the charter fleet, and thus offer greater flexibility in the number of weekly flights & capacity available.

[britanniaboy]

sorry bmibaby.com. but there's a few errors in your post.

thomsonfly doesn't wet lease it's a/c from britannia: britannia is thomsonfly (there is still, at the moment, some distinction betweeen the two within the company, but it is one airline) - thomsonfly lease the aircraft from other companies (as Go-Fly did before it was swallowed up by easyJet).

thomsonfly have sold seat-only for years, under www.britanniadirect.com. this is not a new concept here, it's just that we're going a different way about it.

yes, we (as are all the charter ailrines) are feeling the bite from the likes of EZY and FR on our spanish routes, especially from their big bases like LTN and STN, and to a lesser extent in places like LGW, GLA and NCL. as much as I personally don't agree with the mixed model, we have hit the ground running here because or Low Cost wing is based from airports that have NO presence of LCCs (BOH, CVT) and TUI own major stakes in two of these airports. Not only is this a very shrewd business policy, but we are seen as actively investing in the local area.

There is absolutely no way that TFLY are going to disband and it's going to revert to the Britannia flag again. And where the LCCs are taking away our market (the Med), the charter companies are making ground elsewhere that the LCCs cannot: the massive pick-up in cruise passengers, the massive upturn in families going to Turkey and the still increasing demand for longhaul destinations. THe LCCs cannot compete here (at the moment or for the forseeable future: i doubt P&O will give cruise contratct to easyJet somehow) and I think that most of the charter airlines are quite happy conceding the med for the bright lights and bigge profits of mid and long haul flying

[Mr @ Spotty M]

britanniaboy
I am sorry to point out a slight error in your post.
I quote "(there is still, at the moment, some distinction betweeen the two within the company, but it is one airline)"
It is still two Airlines, it's not the paint scheme that matters, it is what is on your AOC.
Until it is changed by TUI and submitted to the CAA, it remains Britannia and Thomsonfly.
However l would guess, that this might happen for the 1st November.

[Stampe]

Spotty M, Britannia Boy is correct my own copy of the Britannia AOCNoGB294 issue 6 shows Britannia Airways Ltd trading as Britannia Airways and Thomsonfly and includes all variants of the 737/757/767 operated by whatever you like to call it on one certificate.All pilots within the company have copies of the AOC on their personal laptops.Hard to be more up to date than that.Far from becoming divided the loco and charter operations are becoming much more integrated in the "mixed model"":ok:

[LTNman]

I see that Britannia has given up half of hangar 89 at Luton to easyjet and will be vacating it fully in around a years time. Does this mean that Britannia sees the future with a much smaller fleet? I also note the Britannia HQ is moving off airport soon.

[Stampe]

Shouldn,t draw to much conclusions from the vacating of hangar 89 its long term future has been in doubt as a hangar for many years with the long tern plan being more passenger holding pens for loco pax.As for the Uk total fleet expansion forecast in total airframes 73/75/76 for the forseeable future.Who knows where the future will lead us!!?.As for the office move it has to be a no brainer to combine tour and airline administration in a new office less than a mile from the airport free of the hassle and security considerations at vastly reduced rent.:ok:

[7006 fan]

Had heard that CVT was on the market.

[richterscale10]

I heard that TOO !!!

[jabird]

7006 and richter, could you elaborate further?

This would make sense as planning issues are largely resolved, but presumably the actual market value can't be officially settled until the report is out?

Maybe BHX will make a second attempt to buy it, this time for a much higher price than they would have paid when they first considered it in the early 90's!

[Arbottle]

Owners of CVT have said a few times that they would prob. sell the airport if/when they get a new terminal. I would imagine an airport without a terminal or at least planning permission wouldn't be worth an awful lot. I wouldn't call the current portocabin/bodged old building arrangement particularly long term.

They currently have a new application in with WDC for a terminal 3 times the size of the one refused last year. It'll be built in phases, apparently. It has yet to go before WDC's planning committee - there's a surprise, WDC seem to take their time over these things.

www.wdc.gov.uk

[FlyboyUK]

West Dunbartonshire Council??????:rolleyes: :confused: :ooh: