I reckon you're close to it d_concord.

Have a look at the Skywest annual report. Yearly profit in the order of $12mil. and now with an under utilised A320 to pay for, amongst other things.

Slick accounting, special leasing deals, and pushing money around, cannot divert from one inescapable fact.... Someone has to pay for it. in Skywest's case, that's around $300 mil when you factor in 18 aircraft and all the ancillary start up costs.

A $300 mil debt for a company earning around $12 mil a year? Hope I'm wrong, but that would scare the Cr@p outa' me! :uhoh:

You're wrong Krusty. Skywest only owns a few F50's. The rest are leased through a seperate holding company. Skywest has minimal debt.

Virgin loan is for Skywest to offer galactic space tourism.

........

Or just to speed up ATR expansion.

I'm assuming your post is "tounge in cheek" Chadzat.

At least I hope it is! :confused:

Slight thread drift but I don't think that you will see Virgin spliting their operations into different airlines any time soon. They have just spent lots of time, money, and effort smashing together three different operations because, amongst other things it was inefficient.

If there was to be corporate merging down track my guess, and it is only a guess, is that they would absorb Skywest rather than split off some of their existing business to it.

Hi DD,

Could be a valid point. Another might be that Impulse were a competitor and it was cheaper (and quicker) to take them out than loose money competing with them. QF also needed to break the legacy work conditions. VA don't have the same problem I would suggest.

The competitor bit is the issue. Accepting your point made re Impulse and the reason for the takeover. Skywest are not a competitor and Virgin can have Skywest do whatever they need without the need to take them out as well as have the benefit of walking away if they desire.

Seeing this is a rumour network. Rumour has it Skywest were wandering around Canberra earlier this week trying to drum up business with a past shareholder and director of a recently failed airline. If true... not at all clever..:ugh::ugh: