Air Berlin files for Insolvency

[racedo]

https://www.thelocal.de/20170815/air-berlin-files-for-bankruptcy

Difficult time for the staff.

"The reason for this conclusion is that its main shareholder Etihad Airways PJSC has notified Air Berlin PLC of the fact that it will not provide any further financial support to the Air Berlin group,"

[Alsacienne]

Might this not interest Easyjet Europe as regards hulls and employees?

[pabely]

Average age of fleet is 8 / 9 years so I doubt it. Only value are slots.

[eu01]

Slots only? Also the opportunity to fight seems to have value in itself, at least for Ryanair.

Ryanair has today (15 Aug) lodged competition complaints with the German Bundeskartellamt and the European Commission regarding the obvious conspiracy playing out in Germany between the German Government, Lufthansa and Air Berlin to carve up Air Berlin’s assets, while excluding major competitors and ignoring both EU competition and State Aid rules.
Given the fact that the German Government is centrally involved in these manoeuvres, the Bundeskartellamt is likely to struggle to get out of bed. On this basis, and bearing in mind the scale of the market shares and the European implications involved, it is all the more important that the European Commission takes immediate and decisive action.
This manufactured insolvency is clearly being set up to allow Lufthansa to take over a debt-free Air Berlin which will be in breach of all known German and EU competition rules.
Now even the German Government is supporting this Lufthansa-led monopoly with €150m of State Aid so that Lufthansa can acquire Air Berlin and drive domestic air fares in Germany even higher than they already are. German customers / visitors will suffer higher air fares to pay for this Lufthansa monopoly.
Source: corporate.ryanair.com (http://corporate.ryanair.com/news/complaints-lodged-with-german-and-eu-competition-authorities/)

[davidjohnson6]

I can't fault MOL on this - he has my full support on this issue

[lederhosen]

Although I work for the competition I think Ryanair's line about the competition authorities struggle to get out of bed is kind of funny.��

[Harry Wayfarers]

You mean the paint job didn't work?

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/bb/Boeing_737-8AS%2C_Ryanair_AN0367795.jpg/800px-Boeing_737-8AS%2C_Ryanair_AN0367795.jpg

[Flitefone]

You mean the paint job didn't work?

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/bb/Boeing_737-8AS%2C_Ryanair_AN0367795.jpg/800px-Boeing_737-8AS%2C_Ryanair_AN0367795.jpg


How times change! The one organisation not mentioned that has shown a potential interest is IAG. This is Willie Walsh speaking at the IAG 1st half briefing a couple of weeks back: "[There] may be things that are interesting to us [in Air Berlin]," he says, but he stresses that this view is only preliminary and there is "nothing [IAG] is particularly participating in at the moment".

[lederhosen]

The timing of the insolvency is interesting. Usually banks pull the plug on airlines in October at the end of the summer season. The german government has provided a bridging loan (with preferred status apparently) for three months to give time for an orderly winding down and sale of assets more or less by then. Employees pay is also guaranteed for three months although only up to about five thousand 500 euros a month, if I understand the rules correctly. It is a bit of a question mark what the assets are and what they are worth. The slots, routes and employees will be what other airlines are interested in, ideally for free from Ryanair's perspective, as little as they can get away with paying from the viewpoint of LH and perhaps Easyjet.

[toledoashley]

FR certainly has a point about competition rules. I wouldn't be surprised if both of them (EZY or FR) get something out of it - either one of them moving to TXL and getting the AB terminal to themselves, or a decent amount of slots in DUS.

The second point is the future of Niki - I wonder if that could be spun off back into its own business, or if that would be of interest to EZY (thinking about Vienna).

[ATNotts]

Germany appears to be very reluctant to let some of it's more high profile businesses go under; I'd cite Galeria Kaufhof in that regard, which must have been going on now for 3 or 4 years, and looks as though it's heading for trouble yet again.

If Air Berlin had been a British concern it would have gone a while ago now, as the UK government wouldn't be intervening behind the scenes to try and keep what has been a dysfunctional business going to vigourously.

I'm not saying which of the British or German models is correct, or more desirable, but you've got to agree with Michael O'Leary in so far as the German objective, especially in this election year, appears very much to be trying to push as much of AB as it can into the arms of Lufthansa, at the expense of other airlines, such as IAG or Ryanair.

[lederhosen]

Niki is an interesting one. It was reported to have been sold to Et.had, in return for further much needed cash, which raises some possibly awkward questions about non eu ownership. But now that Easyjet has an austrian AOC, they as well as TUI may very well be interested. Strange that Norwegian have not appeared on the radar given the boost they got from the Sterling insolvency. It is kind of ironic that Airberlin is actually a british PLC, while BA I understand is spanish.

[toledoashley]

My contact at Norwegian has said that they are interested in the LH side, nothing in SH for them.

[pabely]

Niki is an interesting one. It was reported to have been sold to Et.had, in return for further much needed cash, which raises some possibly awkward questions about non eu ownership. But now that Easyjet has an austrian AOC, they as well as TUI may very well be interested.

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/air-berlin-sells-niki-as-etihad-approves-new-leisure-432094/

Etihad own only 25% if Niki, wonder where the $320M has gone in Air Berlin, have they burnt through that so quickly?

[lederhosen]

Given the new leisure airline idea was not agreed to by TUI it is unclear if any transaction was ever completed. TUI is certainly not in a great position either. They need to find something to do with 14 Boeings from October and potentially are looking at a big writeoff as an unsecured creditor. The incentive to get involved again in the carve up of Airberlin must be big.

[pabely]

As far as Etihad, they seemed to complete their part of the Niki venture earlier this year.

Etihad exploring options for leisure airline Niki - Gulf Business (http://gulfbusiness.com/etihad-exploring-options-leisure-airline-niki/)

[davidjohnson6]

Air Berlin owns 2 subsidiary airlines - Belair (which is due to shut down in October anyway) and LGW which operates Q400s on very short domestic routes. Is LGW also in the bankruptcy filing as well ?

[Mr A Tis]

Very sad state of affairs. Once a great airline that I flew lots with (well I got to Silver status on Top Bonus). Now I can't remember the last time I flew with them. All seem to go t*ts up when they took on LTU longhaul. Why don't airlines stick to what they are good at ?

[lederhosen]

There are conflicting reports of who owns Niki. Another source suggests the ownership is as follows......Vollständiger Anteilshaber der NIKI Luftfahrt GmbH, welche die Flüge ausführt, ist die NL AB Beteiligungs GmbH. Von dieser wiederum gehören 50,2 % der Niki Privatstifung eV. Die restlichen 49,8 % gehören der Air Berlin PLC & Co, Luftverkehrs KG über die Gehuba Beteiligungsverwaltungs GmbH.

In summary AB it is suggested still owns 49.8% with the rest owned by a trust Niki Privatstiftung. This information may be out of date, but seems plausible. Fact is that various conflicting communications have been made about who owns what. Only insiders at AB really know.

Latest information in the public domain is that LH, Easyjet and Condor are the airlines interested, with some doubts being expressed regarding competition regulations.

[racedo]

If Air Berlin had been a British concern it would have gone a while ago now, as the UK government wouldn't be intervening behind the scenes to try and keep what has been a dysfunctional business going to vigourously.
.

Wot you mean like BCal, DanAir and BMI......................wonder who got control of off of these.

[ATNotts]

Wot you mean like BCal, DanAir and BMI......................wonder who got control of off of these.

Except in the case of BCAL, weren't these takeovers completed without the implicit involvement of the UK government.

My memory may be fading, but I don't recall the UK government chucking money at DA or BD, in fact in the case of the latter, the previous owner, Lufthansa did kill off the BMI Baby division, before flogging the BMI "mainline" chunk to BA.

[eu01]

Lufthansa has received more German government support in its bid to take over substantial assets of insolvent rival Air Berlin, with German Economy Minister Brigitte Zypries saying she would welcome such a move.
Read the entire text on reuters.com (http://www.reuters.com/article/us-air-berlin-lufthansa-idUSKCN1B10T3)

[Harry Wayfarers]

Except in the case of BCAL, weren't these takeovers completed without the implicit involvement of the UK government.

My memory may be fading, but I don't recall the UK government chucking money at DA or BD, in fact in the case of the latter, the previous owner, Lufthansa did kill off the BMI Baby division, before flogging the BMI "mainline" chunk to BA.

As my fading memory recalls BA bought DA for a quid for the DA pilots to sue the b@stards for whatever reason that I cannot recall.

How about BA buying out Brymon and Manx simply for their LHR slots then casting them aside, Maggie, whilst desperate to privatise the national debt, allowed BA to put Freddie Laker, illegally, out of business, so what has changed except the nationality, these days the Germans are looking after their own whilst the French, to name but another, have been doing it all along.

[Heathrow Harry]

and lets not mention Alitalia........... or any number of African airlines

[inOban]

The past is the past. I think that this year the Italian government has been careful to play by the book. I've haven't seen MOL complaining. I think that he has enough muscle to ensure that even Germany does follow the rules also. That's why the single market has rules, and slowly but surely is making everyone follow them.

[Harry Wayfarers]

The past is the past. I think that this year the Italian government has been careful to play by the book. I've haven't seen MOL complaining. I think that he has enough muscle to ensure that even Germany does follow the rules also. That's why the single market has rules, and slowly but surely is making everyone follow them.


That would be why the French continued to ban UK beef imports after the EU had lifted the ban and whilst the French had mad cows all along!

[inOban]

It takes a long time to change a culture. Our Imperial past has given us a tradition of assuming that everything new from abroad must be the greatest; other countries have cherished their local production even when it was undeserving.