Who will be Southwest's merger partner?

[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.

 

[Nightrain_080]

Why doesn't SW start their own Hawaii and Mexico runs? The growth will continue

 

[DesertFalcon]

Alaska is my hugely uneducated guess. More west coast presence, especially the northwest. Mostly 737 fleet.

Actually, that is one I didn't think about. Alaska might be a good merger?

I don't think would be the only addition to SWA. They really need more than just an Alaska merger.

SWA really needs to stay with there successful model; merging with other aircraft types just makes them like everyone else... They need to avoid this at all costs!

 

[Secret Squirrel]

Why doesn't SW start their own Hawaii and Mexico runs? The growth will continue

It is probably easier to buy someone who has ETOPS in their ops already with ETOPS airplanes.

 

[Esprit]

Why would anyone want to be WN's "merger partner"? Didn't you guys see what they did to their "codeshare partner"?

ESPRIT

 

[GuppyWN]

I take offense to that.

We didn't "do" anything to ATA except buy the gates YOU had for sale and give you an interest free loan of $135 MILLION bucks.

And whoever / whatever it is it aint gonna be a "merger."

Gup