Who will be Southwest's merger partner?

[Jet41]

Colgan

 

[Andy]

No merger, just internal growth. My bet is that the bulk of it occurs in DEN. F9 will be shrinking in bankruptcy and LUV is likely planning a big expansion there. That should be enough to keep them busy for a while. It'll be interesting to see if LUV pushes to pick up a bunch of A gates in DEN.

 

[FatesPawn]

You're right, if it wasn't for the recent legislation, I'd be much more concerned.

If the company is sold whole, the pilots go.

If the company is parted out while still a viable entity, the pilots have to go with any deal that is considered a large portion of the operation taken as a large combination of aircraft and gates to a single buyer.

Lear,

I don't disagree with you that the Bond/McCaskill legislation makes it much harder to NOT take employees.....

...however, the new legislation only applies IF employees are part of the deal. A scenario like the former Muse/Transtar deal perhaps operated separately, in a wet-lease deal slowly moving assets like gates and airplanes over the the acquiring company that DOES NOT involve the transfer of people does not fall under the language of the Bond/McCaskill legislation.

This may sound far fetched but the bottom line is Allegheny Mohawk will only apply if people are part of the deal. If it's for assets only, your merger/fragmentation language is your only protection.

-fate

 

[WalterSobchak]

I'm certain no one wants our 717's... it's probably what kept someone from coming after us before. The problem is selling them to someone who wants what we owe on them.

I could see Hawaiian interested in a few of them for interisland service...not sure who would take the remaining 80-something airframes.

 

[GuppyWN]

No merger, just internal growth. My bet is that the bulk of it occurs in DEN. F9 will be shrinking in bankruptcy and LUV is likely planning a big expansion there. That should be enough to keep them busy for a while. It'll be interesting to see if LUV pushes to pick up a bunch of A gates in DEN.

Nail meet hammer. Good summation Andy. I was in DAL this week and there's big talk about DEN. Market it growing exponentially and most all our growth plans this year were focused on Denver. That was before Friday. I'd expect a major push second half of the year to include taking more airplanes and pilots than expected for 2008.

Gup

 

[bmxandjets]

Nail meet hammer. Good summation Andy. I was in DAL this week and there's big talk about DEN. Market it growing exponentially and most all our growth plans this year were focused on Denver. That was before Friday. I'd expect a major push second half of the year to include taking more airplanes and pilots than expected for 2008.

Gup

so would that mean HR would start gearing up for more interviews..?

 

[Secret Squirrel]

so would that mean HR would start gearing up for more interviews..?

Or they could buy someone, like airtran, and pull overlapping capacity, like BWI, and send it to Denver.

 

[GuppyWN]

BMX, don't know. I didn't ask how deep the pool was but last I heard there are 3 classes this month and 2 in May. Could very well be just to catch up. We are fat on the captain side and really short on FO's. I love the F9 guys and hope they are doing all the right things to revive their cash position but if there is a void left in Denver I'd hope it would be us that filled it.

I'm just a line guy. All I have is speculation based on what I heard in Dallas.

Gup

 

[RedDogC130]

I think the pool was 300+ deep...from what I remember way back

 

[vandypilot]

Spirit has gates in LGA, BOS, ATL

 

[Skybus]

Spirit has gates in LGA, BOS, ATL

One would have to assume is we wanted gates in those places we would have kept the ATA gates that they gave up???

 

[TZtoSWA]

so would that mean HR would start gearing up for more interviews..?

From one of our chiefs this week. We may be interviewing this year after all but...
it won't be until late summer or early fall at the earliest.

 

[Lear70]

Lear,

I don't disagree with you that the Bond/McCaskill legislation makes it much harder to NOT take employees.....

...however, the new legislation only applies IF employees are part of the deal. A scenario like the former Muse/Transtar deal perhaps operated separately, in a wet-lease deal slowly moving assets like gates and airplanes over the the acquiring company that DOES NOT involve the transfer of people does not fall under the language of the Bond/McCaskill legislation.

This may sound far fetched but the bottom line is Allegheny Mohawk will only apply if people are part of the deal. If it's for assets only, your merger/fragmentation language is your only protection.

-fate

I agree with you completely...

In all these scenarios, we haven't talked about ANYTHING being done slowly; we've talked outright purchase.

If they purchase the entire operation, they have to take the pilots, that's in our M&A language.

What's not in there is clear language on fragmentation, i.e. they buy the entire airline then immediately split it up. That's covered by Bond/McCaskill.

If the airTran BoD were to sign a deal to slowly transfer portions to other places, similar to how ATA has slowly eased into the sunset, then we'd likely be screwed.

Fortunately (for now), we're not in a position to need to do that operationally. It would have to be a LOT of money to even consider it. Southwest doesn't really spend money like that without getting it bargain-basement and, thankfully, they seem to be focused elsewhere at the moment.

It's all a big crap shoot anyway.

 

[Green Banana]

So, as I understand it, LUV went with ATA for the Hawaii connection. Now that ATA is out of the picture, Won't they go for somebody with some Hawaii routes. Somebody that goes to say, Honolulu, Kauai, and newly announced Maui with an all 737 fleet?????

 

[Cobra17]

I'm guessing they are looking for an international codeshare partner since that's where the revenue is. I've heard they are willing to swap some Harlingen gates for some Singapore Air FA's.