Southwest to buy AirTran...

[johnsonrod]

I fear for Dolce's safety. This is akin to drawing a Islam cartoon in a public paper, for such heresy he will have to be hunted down and slaughtered in the name of the firm, SWA.

And he even admitted he didn't like going to DEN! Blasphemy! One thing he did leak was that not every Southwest pilot is happy, and it seems that will spread after the SLI. Unique culture? Hopefully you can retain that in the future.

 

[ivauir]

I fear for Dolce's safety. This is akin to drawing a Islam cartoon in a public paper, for such heresy he will have to be hunted down and slaughtered in the name of the firm, SWA.

Not on this site.

SWAHATE is the FI religion.

D posts his typical "woe is me BS" and the haters can't contain their giddiness. Keep in mind that D can't get elected cause the rest of the pilot group doesn't buy into his bitter BS.

 

[dicko]

This is getting freaky .......

 

[ivauir]

http://www.ajc.com/business/

ATLANTA BUSINESS NEWS 5:22 p.m. Wednesday, February 2, 2011Text size:
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AirTran haggled but saw few options

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

AirTran Airways executives pushed for a bigger payout for shareholders over weeks of meetings with Southwest Airlines and were weighing potential options for alternatives just days before approving the merger deal.

Southwest’s chief executive, Gary Kelly, first called Bob Fornaro, his counterpart at AirTran, last April 21 to launch merger discussions, the filing says.But they concluded AirTrat didn’t have any options for other merger partners, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. It offers a few new details about the pending deal that will put Southwest in Atlanta for the first time.

Southwest offered $6.50 a share and AirTran countered with $8 a share, before the two sides settled on the $7.25 to $7.75 range that was part of the final deal announced in September.

At an AirTran board meeting in Atlanta on Sept. 21, AirTran financial advisor Morgan Stanley presented background on the airline’s efforts to grow, “and discussed its views regarding the lack of any other potential merger partners or financial buyers for AirTran.”

Among the reasons AirTran agreed to the deal, according to the filing, were the risks and competitive position of standing alone “in a consolidating, competitive industry,” and management’s view that “there were no realistic other potential candidates for an alternative business combination transaction.”

Terms of the deal were hashed out in late September and on Sept. 26 the boards of each airline approved.

Shareholder and regulatory approvals are pending, with an AirTran shareholder meeting set for March 23. According to the filing, several state antitrust officials have asked for information, but Georgia’s attorney general’s office, which does not have an antitrust section, is not among them.

AirTran and Southwest face several shareholder lawsuits seeking to block the deal and last week reached a memo of understanding to settle two of them. Details weren’t in the filing, but it said the deal called for additional disclosures to shareholders, along with payment of attorneys’ fees. The settlement would resolve claims challenging the merger, according to the SEC filing.

 

[dicko]

Southwest could expand overseas as early as 2012

By Christopher Hinton MarketWatch
2/3/2011 01:37:10 PM
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NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Southwest Airlines Co. could expand its near-international destinations as early as 2012 upon the delivery of its first Boeing Co. 737-800s, the company's chief financial officer said Thursday. The Dallas-based, low-cost carrier is also in the process of acquiring AirTran Holdings , which has flights to the Caribbean and provides needed experience in overseas flying, CFO Laura Wright said, during an analyst conference. "We're certainly going to learn a lot about those international markets with AirTran," adding that the 737-800 jet is a better aircraft for expanding international markets, "should we want to."

 

[jhill]

Yeah, it's awful here!!!!

So awful I just got paid 15 tfp for flying to PHL and DHing home. Less than 10 hours of duty. I wont get in to the pay. Viva VJA!

 

[FIREMAN]

Laura Wright– Southwest Airlines Co. – SVP Finance and CFO
Okay, so the question I think was how we see the Company evolving post-AirTran over the next two to three years.
Certainly, AirTran is going to be our significant — it's going to be a significant effort for us.
When we close, we anticipate we will have two separate airlines, but over time we will transition into one airline, one brand, one product. That's probably going to take two to three years.
We are very excited about the acquisition because we think AirTran brings a lot of things to Southwest. Certainly, Atlanta was an important, important piece to us. It's an airport that has limited access, and AirTran has a great presence there.
With Atlanta, we're going to be able to do a lot more with the rest of the Southwest network. For example, there's a lot of cities that AirTran doesn't serve out of Atlanta where Southwest has a huge presence. So we see opportunities there.
AirTran gives us more access to some places we couldn't get into, like Washington Reagan, so we're going to be picking up some flight activity there. It also allows us to grow our presence at New York LaGuardia with the slots that they have.
So, but I think for you to think about bigger picture is we will have a larger network. We will have more cities and the value that you get when you bring those together is exponential. We think we will be able to tap some markets, combined, between the two networks that neither of us would have been able to do alone.

 

[Ty Webb]

I would agree. If you look at places where we have only three flights a day, all to ATL, you have to ask, "What could the frequency be if we add connections to SWA cities? How many other point-to-point cities could we add? How many Business travelers would we add if we had more than three lousy flights a day?".

I'm thinking this deal looks smarter every day.

 

[CaptWidgeon]

dolce, +1

 

[FLYLOW22]

B737 service to Tokyo!!!