British Airways and Iberia have shortlisted a dozen airlines, including one in the Middle East, which they are eying as possible candidates for acquisition.
BA CEO Willie Walsh said the British airline and Spanish carrier Iberia aim to conclude merger talks later this year. The merger and joint venture with American Airlines would lead to the creation of International Airlines Group (IAG) and Walsh said in Mumbai recently that he plans to target more carriers for possible consolidation.
“With Iberia, we have had a number of meetings where we have looked at airlines around the world and identified those that would be attractive to us in joining IAG. We started with a list of about 40 airlines. We have narrowed it down to about twelve,” Walsh said.
The final twelve is rumoured to include Qantas, Cathay Pacific, Air Berlin, India’s Kingfisher Airlines, Chile’s LAN and Gulf Air, Bahrain’s national carrier. However, Walsh added that no talks had yet taken place with any airlines and not all twelve carriers shortlisted would be approached.
“This is just to give us a focus. We have not had any discussions with any airlines. There is nothing going on at the moment. We want to create a platform for like-minded airlines – those who believe that consolidation is part of the answer for the industry – to be able to join us. We would not pursue all twelve,” he said.
Last month, Walsh told Arabian Business that he believed consolidation would be a common trend in the industry in the near future. While he confirmed that he has not had any discussions with any Middle Eastern carriers, he did not rule out any approaches in the future.
“We have not had any discussions with anybody but when we are looking at the development of the industry over the next five to ten years the Middle east will play a more important role and that makes carriers in the region more attractive than they had been in the past.
“It is a market and a region that has a lot of opportunity and one of the things we will do is to make sure we have a strong presence in the region and I am sure there will be opportunities in the future,” Walsh added.
The TTG report added that Walsh will become CEO of IAG and BA finance director Keith Williams will become the new CEO of BA.
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