Air France & Alitalia merger?

Can’t see it happening

Jesus Christ, French and Italian State companies merging… think of the red tape 😮

It’s about an alliance , not a merge !

My friend,

I had a look at my archive to see what is available. I found this article posted by flight international on 22/7/2003. Basically, what the article states, there is intentions by the two carriers to form alliance on the routes betweeen France and Italy, however there are concerns by the EU that this would create monopoly to the markets.

I have no information about Alitalia’s potential privatisation. However, what is interesting, the airline recently has signed a contract with TURNWORKS, the US consultancy company that is founded by the former Chief Executive of Continental Airlines, Mr Greg Brenemman. The agreements aims for the consultancy company to “support the competitive and commercial positioning” of the airline. Is this an early indication that the ailrine is heading for restructing, to become more profitable, hence an interesting airline to invest by private investors? Time will tell.

Below, I copy pasted the article(s) for reference.

The European Commission denies that it is about to approve the alliance between Air France and Alitalia as claimed by Francesco Mengozzi, chairman of Alitalia, in an interview with French daily Les Echos last week. Competition commissioner Mario Monti says the alliance raises significant problems, notably on the Paris-Rome, Paris-Milan and Lyons-Milan routes, where a near monopoly would be created by the alliance. Monti says these problems need to be addressed, but in general the commission is in favour of such alliances in the airline sector.

Also, I have pasted below another article that relates to the matter.

European competition commissioner Mario Monti is expressing optimism that the proposed alliance between SkyTeam partners Alitalia and Air France will be approved despite his recent comments in Italy that issues remain to be addressed.

A spokeswoman for the EC competition division says Monti has stressed that the Alitalia/Air France link “poses important competition concerns” on routes between France and Italy – specifically trunk routes such as Paris-Rome and Paris-Milan as well as services such as Milan-Lyon.

EC regulators are still examining the proposed alliance but the spokeswoman says that Monti is “optimistic” that a solution will be found in the SkyTeam case in the same way that competition worries within other partnerships have been overcome.

She adds that “some progress” has been made in addressing the difficulties, during regular contacts with the two airlines, but “obviously not enough so as to enable clearance”.

While she says that the EC sets itself internal deadlines for dealing with such cases, the organisation is staying quiet on dates by which it expects to draw final conclusions on the partnership.

Last year the EC stressed to the two carriers that it accepted that there were strong economic reasons for their proposed alliance but that it was worried about their combined dominance on flights between their Milan, Rome and Paris hubs.

This is a stock article. We hear about this merge since years.
Wait and see….

Hwoever a for the new C/S I guess that AF has much better to do right now and a merge with AZ would be a very bad idea just before their privatization.

I think there was some news for Alitalia privitzation but didnt hear much about it till date.