I believe Polax 52 was referring to the closure of the AACS base at STN, years after the formation of GSS. AACS consisted of European pilots flying Atlas schedules, not to be confused with the GSS flights for BAWC.

Liege hub will remain in operation!
 

Logistics Markets: Express & Mail

UPS buys TNT Express for $5bn
19/Mar/2012 by Staff Writer.

After years of rumours and a comparatively short offer-period, UPS has agreed to buy TNT Express for €5.16bn/US$6.77bn.

In an announcement this morning (Monday 19th), the boards of the two companies issued a joint statement outlining the price and the conditions of the sale. The statement also included a report on the position of the dominant shareholder, PostNL, committing it "irrevocably" to the deal.

It appears that TNT Express will continue as a separate entity for some time rather than its assets being wholly absorbed into the European divisions of UPS. The statement asserted that "all employee rights, covenants, and benefits under current ownership will be respected." This may refer to agreements with the workforce over pensions and other benefits which were rumoured to be an important aspect of the negotiations to buy the company.

Importantly the statement also continues; "UPS undertakes to create a meaningful centre of excellence for marketing, sales, and operations in the Netherlands. UPS recognizes the significant value of TNT Express' operations, assets and people in Liège and will seek to continue the future utilisation of these operations, assets and people within the combined group." This appears to suggest that the headquarters of UPS in Europe will move to Amsterdam and more clearly that the Liege hub will remain in operation. The implications for existing UPS operations in Europe may be significant.
UPS is financing the deal out of a mix of US$3bn in cash and "new debt arrangements".

That looks , at first glance, as not being too bad for LGG and Europe as a whole.
Anybody have news about TNT ops in the US, Brazil and Asia, the 3 money-loosing markets (total = 500 million$ operating losses ,at least) ?

Let's hope they don't silently get the shaft with all the focus apparently on the EU TNT branche.

BrowntailWhale , your arrogance and ignorance are revealing. You may feel that your company deserves congratulations for purchasing a failing operation in a financially difficult and demographic time bomb that is Europe , but you may discover that UPS recieves nothing but lawsuits, EU Anti trust misery , and compounding merger related " costs. " in return. The money spent on lawyers and consultants will be eye- watering. While UPS / TNT are busy developing " synergies " , the other logistics providers will be busy poaching all those valuable customers. The real prize is a developed Asian/Chinese network , which as we all know , is at the whim of the Chinese Communist Party and can be " reconfigured " at short notice. America`s empire , along with it`s moral authority , business acumen and respect in the world is unfortunately in decline. Good luck , you`re going to need it. :ok:

Those press reports could indicate that there will be less browntail N numbered jets flying in Europe. Which would be deliciously ironic, if one was so inclined.

Good luck to all involved.

Hopefully with the ratification of EASA/JAA this year, FAA pilots and N-reg aircraft will not be able to fly in Europe freely as they do at the moment - and I welcome it…!!

Because TNT up to today is still bigger in Europe than UPS is? UPS is bigger worldwide but can't compete with TNT in Europe. So why should TNT people have to pay the bill?

Thank you capitalism then I would say. The guy with more money buys whatever he can afford. He buys to be big. But the "bigness" was created by other people. Those you want to see fired now?

Not quite...

AACS was originally formed by Atlas as a union-busting group, prior to Atlas pilots having a union contract, to fly the BAWC contract with non-union, mostly European pilots. They quickly expanded to non-BAWC flying, taking other jobs from American pilots.

GSS was a 2nd iteration of AACS, with many of those same pilots flying the same BAWC contract with the same airplanes, now under UK registry. It was formed just as the Atlas pilots were reaching a contract agreement. AACS still flew backup for GSS until AACS was closed.

Just recently Atlas tried to use GSS in their MIA-South America flying, using the 744s that were replaced by the -8s for BAWC. That was clearly prohibited by the Atlas pilots' contract, and didn't last very long.

If Europeans were/are so keen to retain the BAWC/TNT flying for Europeans, then why didn't Europeans buy TNT? Why didn't Europeans form GSS (or otherwise bid the BAWC contract) on their own, instead of Atlas having to shop around for a UK grocery store heir to put up some money and pretend he was the controlling interest?

I suspect the EU carbon tax scheme will do more to cause non-European carriers to pull out of Europe than any EASA/JAA ratification. What does EASA have to do with "open skies" or "freedom of flight" treaties?

Just as an aside, since it has no relevance to the UPS/TNT situation, AACS (then renamed AABO) also employed American pilots. And in the here and now Atlas employs a significant number of pilots with European passports.

The structure and politics of AACS/AABO were complex, but most of all it was a mess.

Off topic, all good in theory but everyone knows that BAWC were pulling the strings. If BAWC wanted to give the flying to someone else they would have. Instead, they wanted to stay with Atlas so the creation of what is the virtual airline of GSS was born, a company with no assets apart from a few desks and chairs and a majority 51% UK investor that is/was Mr Tesco to keep it legal.

Back on topic, I hope all goes well for the TNT boys and girls in this takeover/merger.

There is always a lot of angst and worry when a company is bought, especially when the one doing the buying is an overseas company. UPS has revealed their reasoning for buying TNT and it certaintly looks reasonable. But the other side of the coin is: Why is TNT selling the airline?. Good question and UPS may be a savior, not an interloper.

FedEx for sure does not allow any European operator to fly jet aircraft :ugh:

...But UPS seems to allow Maersk StarAir to fly some B767 all over Europe :ok:


http://storage.canalblog.com/26/75/594547/71323488.jpg

One of the Turkish haulers (MNG or ACT), who by most standards qualififes as an European operator, are doing a run to TLV. Can't remember if it's for UPS or FedEx, but I'm leaning towards the latter.

Besides, UPS are going to run into ownership issues with TNT Airways. The rules say, by and large, max 49% of shares and no direct control for a non-EU company. This means the airline will have to be spun off, and it can either be terminated, handed over to someone else and forgotten, or handed over to someone else along with a long-term contract to operate x number of aircraft.

But TNT and UPS are both trucking companies with airlines added on as a bit of an afterthought. The real expansion is therefore likely to happen on the ground, and even with consolidation and all that's going to mean lots of jobs for European hauliers and at sorting/distribution centres. Which is all good, except if you're working in LGG and/or at TNT Airways or any of it's airport stations - consolidation on the aviation side is likely to outstrip growth and therefore jobs will be lost, on the ground and in the air in the short to medium term.

It's not for FedEx. FedEx fly their own jets to TLV.

That would be our Cologne based A300, flying for UPS.

Thanks for clearing that up.

There are some posters on here who are being WAY oversensitive.

BrowntailWhale was clearly not gloating in any way, shape or form, and to be frank, the only sensible post on this thread was made by airpolice.

Pride does not make one a prick, even if it is without consideration of others.

HBB if that isn't gloating what is it. It is grossly unfair that N reg acft can fly unhindered round Europe when European reg'd acft cannot do the same in the US. UPS can buy 100% of TNT but TNT would only have been able to buy 49% of UPS. It will be interesting to see what happens in the next few months/years.

Good luck to all involved.

Oh and Browntailed whale N is not a number.

Can't wait for all brown tailed aircraft to be thrown OUT
And that time is coming my friends...