Pay raise for Hawaiian Airlines CEO

[mdanno808]

FARE WAR ANYBODY?

Mesa Air Group Plans to Establish Independent Inter-Island Hawaiian Airline
Friday September 23, 7:00 am ET

PHOENIX, Sept. 23 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Mesa Air Group, Inc. (Nasdaq: MESA - News) today announced its intention to establish an independent inter-island Hawaiian airline with service expected to begin in the 1st quarter of 2006.


Mesa's Hawaiian operations will be conducted using state of the art new generation regional jets in a high quality, high frequency service, connecting the islands of Hawaii with service to the Hilo, Honolulu, Kona, Lihue and Maui (Kahului) markets. The aircraft will be incremental to Mesa's current fleet. The Company anticipates it will formally announce detailed scheduling, consumer marketing and branding plans for the new inter-island Hawaiian airline in the near future.

Mesa intends to form a new company, in partnership with other financial investors, to operate under its own Hawaiian brand. The company will use the latest technology in order to simplify the ticketing and reservation process and expects to market primarily over the Internet. "Project Hele" as it is known within the Company, has been under study since early 2004. Consistent with the Company's plans to operate as an independent inter-island Hawaiian airline, Mesa has been in discussions with other airlines regarding potential code share agreements.

Mesa currently operates 182 aircraft with over 1,100 daily system departures to over 165 cities, 44 states, the District of Columbia, Canada, and Mexico and is particularly well suited to establish a strong and stable independent inter-island Hawaiian airline. Mesa was founded in 1982 and has been profitable on a pro forma basis for 27 out of the last 28 quarters. The Company will have annual revenues in excess of $1 billion in 2005 and has approximately $275 million in cash. In recognition of the Company's accomplishments and exemplary service to the public, Mesa was named 2005 Regional Airline of the Year by Air Transport World Magazine.

"We are delighted to announce this new service in Hawaii. While Mesa is new to Hawaii, we have contemplated inter-island service as far back as 1990," said Jonathan Ornstein, Mesa's Chairman and CEO. "We believe our industry leading cost structure, strong financial position and high quality operations will allow us to provide a consistent and outstanding level of service. We would like to offer a warm 'mahalo' to the many folks we have already met in Hawaii for the kind welcome we have received. The Mesa family looks forward to getting to know the people of Hawaii."

Mesa currently operates 182 aircraft with over 1,100 daily system departures to over 165 cities, 44 states, the District of Columbia, Canada, and Mexico. Mesa operates as America West Express, US Airways Express and United Express under contractual agreement with America West, US Airways and United Airlines, respectively, and independently as Mesa Airlines. The Company, founded by Larry and Janie Risley in New Mexico in 1982, has approximately 5,000 employees. Mesa is a member of the Regional Airline Association and Regional Aviation Partners. The Company was named 2005 Regional Airline of the Year by Air Transport World Magazine.

This press release contains various forward-looking statements that are based on management's beliefs, as well as assumptions made by and information currently available to management. Although the Company believes that the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are reasonable; it can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to have been correct. Such statements are subject to certain risks, uncertainties and assumptions. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those anticipated, estimated, projected or expected. The Company does not intend to update these forward-looking statements prior to its next filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

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[aspire]

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_WTF_​

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Mesa please go home​

 

[Erndogg]

Mesa Air Group Plans to Establish Independent Inter-Island Hawaiian Airline

Where does Orinstien have the idea that he can succeed in a market that is SHRINKING daily and already has 3 established carriers?
Now with Fly HI and Mesa there will be 5 carriers in a pretty small market. Who do you think will fail and how long will it take?
History is bound to repeat itself with the likes of Mahalo,Discovery and Midpac being part of the Hawaiian inter-isle graveyard.

One thing that I saw posted elsewhere, pulled from the court filling-I think, is that the deal is dependant on Aloha terminating both the ALPA and IAM pension plans.

I am guessing that they are referring to the A plan, hopefully it is not both the A and B plans.

Boy, That SUCKS! Is there any indication on what thier plan is? 757's, a/c for inter-isle?

 

[RJP]

Ern, to answer your question about who will fail and how long will it take. While a lot of local customers have "brand loyalty" to HAL/AQ (not so much with WP), when a company WITH MONEY TO SPEND, comes in, pushes their product and flies CRJs inter-island, I think we're all in trouble. AQ needed to re-fleet years ago. Fuel costs and equiptment age must be killing them. HA has a great fleet but again, fuel costs will be higher than an RJ or prop.

Island Air will take it in the shorts with the POS DHC-8-100s we've got. Old, slow, smelly, noisy, need I go on? We've got the market cornered in LNY and JHM but Mesa can jump on MKK and LNY and kill us in a fare war. Besides, how many guys will bail from WP to fly an RJ?

FlyHI, my guess, won't even start here if Mesa really does arrive.

So, in my humble opinion, if Mesa makes this work, drops shiny CRJs in the islands and offers "state of the art" check-in, low fares, etc, WE'RE ALL in trouble. Hope it doesn't happen.

 

[HAL]

Without a 'sugar daddy' airline like America West or USAirways to pay Mesa a fee-for-departure, they're likely to burn through a lot more cash than they expect. Those RJ's cost a lot more per seat-mile than most other airplanes, especially on routes as short as the interisland ones are. Think about how little difference in operating cost there is between a 50 seat RJ and a 110 seat 717. Now think about 60 seats less revenue.

I don't think coming to the islands is a bluff on Mesa's part, but I'd bet there is more than meets the eye on this. Are they looking to eventually make a deal with HA or AQ to become the 'regional' carrier for one or both of them? Quite possibly yes. Ornstein is a real a$$, but he doesn't go throwing money around needlessly. Mesa's problem is that they are losing business as the new AWA/USA cuts them out of their regional operations, but they still have a lot of planes on order. Where will they use them? That is probably one part of what is driving this plan. The most important question is how long can Ornstein sustain a losing proposition like this before he gets his code-share deal, or bails out completely?

HAL

 

[AQ PILOT]

"The Plan" as it is being called does not assume the liabilities of the ALPA or IAM retirement plans. The A plan ALPA has is pretty close to whole so that means there will be a fight from both the Pilots and the PGBC on what will happen.

All I know is that Yucaipa has two real princes on its board of directors. The least liberal being Bill Clinton. The other one, Jesse Jackson, is just flat out there.

Dan you're right, it's the Republican's fault gas prices are so high. It's all Bush, Cheney, and Haliburton. The madness of it all, a company being able to charge what it wants for its product. You're lucky I'm not in charge... I'd be selling jetfuel to HAL at $3.00 a gallon and to AQ at pennies on the dollar and give myself a helluva writeoff. ;-) Easy big guy...playin' with ya...

Forgot to answer the question of what else was being asked of us for concessions. The company came to us with the world's largest laundry list. The only thing I didn't see on it was first born children and mother-in-laws. It was THAT ugly. In my estimation, things are gonna get REALLY interesting in the next few months... My bet is that we end up with HAL's contract and AQ's current wages. I don't want either of those...

 

[mdanno808]

I'm betting that AWA uses Mesa as it's interisland service via code share. HAL what say's you?

 

[HAL]

I'm betting that AWA uses Mesa as it's interisland service via code share. HAL what say's you?

I'd say that it is a possibility, but if so, I think Ornstein is betting a lot of money on a hunch. I don't think AWA has talked to Mesa about it, and in fact when the announcement came last week about AWA dropping code share with HA on the PHX-HNL flights, they specificly said they were keeping the code-share interisland.

After spending the last 24 hours thinking about it, there are even more reasons than I said above why Mesa would be committing suicide to go it alone.

1) Baggage. Our passengers hate riding on a Mesa code-share flight because there is no overhead baggage space for carry-ons on the RJ. Just picture a tourist family with piles of carry-on baggage, or a local going home after a day at the ala moana shopping center. "What do you mean I can't take my bags?!?!"

2) Cargo. HA and AQ make a big portion of their interisland profit carrying mail & cargo. The RJ's have no room for that, so no extra $ beyond passenger fares.

And as I said above,

3) Cost. Seat mile cost is way above the 717 or even the 737-200. Fewer seats, no cargo, pi$$ed off passengers. How in the world are they going to make a profit? They can't unless they code share. With who? Even if they do code share with AWA, that's maybe 400 passengers a day into the islands. How many will use interisland flights vs. staying in HNL. Maybe 300? Well, there's six flights a day. Now what do they do with the rest of their fleet?

AWA CEO Doug Parker has said (and I was there to hear it myself) that he "strongly dislikes" working with Mesa, and wants out of the contract with them. He's stuck for now because Ornstein was so good at writing the contract to his benefit. But I seriously doubt Parker would be interested in joining up with Mesa again in the islands.

Just my 2 cents.

HAL

 

[Dan Roman]

I think your right and I think Ornstein would find trying to do business in Hawaii might be tougher than he thinks. Were is he going to park? He gets in line behind HAL, AQ and Island Air for gates. There is no room for him in HNL or OGG.
Can't help but wonder if Bob K is behind this. He was talking to Ornstein when he was trying to put together his HARC farce and he hates Hawaiian. Revenge? Even if he's not, he did talk to Ornstein 18 months ago about Hawaii. Thanks Bob!

 

[Sleepyhead]

JO wanted to make a bid on AQ but the word is Banmiller would not show him the books. Think it was an accident the announcement came right at the time AQ announced it had a new investor?

the big problem is if they manage to get a few planes flying in HI they will under cut everyones prices and local people will fly them. They already complain that inter-island prices are to high, they will fly on anyone who gives a lower price.
Inter island traffic is down so another carrier flying here will hurt everyone and no one will be making money. The reaction of management will be to cut the number of flights which will mean more AQ and HAL pilots being furloughed.

time to call your local politician and stop this before it starts