 |
| Government to make second attempt at selling Adria Airways |
The privatisation of Slovenia’s national carrier, Adria Airways, is set to begin next month, the Slovenian Sovereign Holding (SDH), which manages the sale of state-owned assets, has confirmed. It will mark the second time the country has attempted to sell its national carrier, with the first back in 2012 producing no results. Earlier this year, the now former Slovenian Prime Minister, Alenka Bratušek, said Adria would be sold by the end of 2014. However, these plans will not materialise as SDH says a new privatisation advisor will first have to be selected before the actual sales process begins in early 2015.
Adria’s last privatisation attempt in 2012 was shrouded in secrecy. In August 2012, the government offered 74.8% of the airline’s shares and interested parties had until September that year to submit non binding bids. The Assets Management Agency (AUKN) confirmed that ten parties submitted non binding offers but declined to give out their names. Up until now there has been no official information given on who submitted their offers nor has the privatisation attempt officially been declared a failure. It is believed that Welcome Air, a small Austrian-based airline operating two turboprop aircraft and the Dutch company Panta Holdings, which in 2012 purchased the German airline OLT Express (which has since gone bankrupt), were amongst the bidders. Also rumoured to have been interested was Germany’s Intro Aviation, a consultancy firm which has turned around several loss making airlines, including NFD (presently known as Eurowings) as well as dBa and LTU International Airlines, which have since been integrated into Air Berlin.
Earlier this year, Adria Ariways’ CEO, Mark Anžur, said the company could expand without a strategic partner. Over the summer, Mr. Anžur said, “It is hard to find a buyer for the airline”. The words were echoed by the Slovenian Ministry for Infrastructure and Spatial Planning, which said Adria already has strategic partners since it is a member of Star Alliance and added that Adria can operate successfully independently. However, Adria has performed worse than expected this year and has run into liquidity problems this winter despite selling some of its aircraft and attempting to expand and open up bases beyond its borders. So far, the government has successfully privatised Ljubljana Airport’s operator Aerodrom Ljubljana and is finalising the sale of maintenance company Adria Airways Tehnika, which is no longer a subsidiary of Adria Airways.
Please take this question like platform for discussion, not for sometthing more. Well if we assume that some airline would buy Adria Airways, which airline this would be?
ReplyDeleteHonestly I don't see any established airline buying Adria. Slovenia is small market, very little upside. The only companies for it would make a lot of sense would be one of the Balkan airlines most notably OU just to close them down and swallow the competition but chance of that happening is probably slim to none.
DeleteBesides all of this, cudos to current management for looking out of the box. I don't think that there is enough room for this many airlines in such a small geographic area.
I really don't think that anybody will buy Adria nor Croatia Airlines, because Air Serbia is right next to them and it is expanding rapidly. Whoever buys OU or Adria, it would have to compete with ASL. With OU which is spreading across the Croatian airports with it's fleet which is smaller than the one in ASL, and Adria which is spreading everywhere but not in Ljubljana (Tirana, Pristina, Lodz) they can't do anything to Air Serbia. OU would have to base all their airplanes in ZAG, or Adria in LJU, and that wouldn't help too, because ASL will have two daily flights to ZAG and LJU from December. So Air Serbia's strategy obviously is destroying 'competition' so nobody would invest in them and ASL could destroy them like that.
ReplyDeleteWhy do you think that nobody would challenge ASL? On what grounds? You are basically saying that the situation in the Balkans is sealed. On the other hand I think that it's very fluid.
DeleteOf course LJU will never be an ex-YU hub, but also the majority of the passengers from LJU will never transfer via BEG. Adria is thinking out of the box and try to something new. Why not? I think it is at least an interesting idea how to position a regional airline in the EU. And, yes, I agree with the first comment that there will be lots of other airline with different type of product competing on the Balkans, not just Air Serbia.
DeleteTK?
DeleteLjudi meni nesto sole pamet ovde a neznaju da je TK najveca aviokompanija na Balkanu i sire ;)
DeleteINN-NS
Jedino ADR moze da kupi DLH i niko vise.
ReplyDeleteA CTN morace sam da se snadje bez kupca iz inostranstva.
INN-NS
Why ADR yes, and CTN no? Don't tell me that this is because Slovenia is not bordering Serbia :D You are a funny person, very funny. Boring too.
ReplyDeleteNije zbog toga sto Slovenia ne granici sa Srbijom nego zbog toga sto ADR bolje sluzi DLH i za njih ispunjavaju plan unistenja LOT-a .
DeleteAjde vi meni navedite jednog potencijalnog kupca CTN osm DLH.
INN-NS
Air Serbia???
DeleteI don't know of any. The sad thing is that you think you know everything and you don't have any experience at all. Your post is telling only that you are obsessed with ctn. The topic is about adr.
DeleteYou know that asl is going long haul in march, that the first wide body is coming in march and that nobody will buy ctn. That tells a lot my friend.
Pa tako su mi rekli ljudi iz ASL da dolazi u Martu-Aprilu.I nigde nisam rekao da letovi krecu u Martu-Aprilu tad dolazi A330 tako kazu.
DeleteTo sam naucio od vas u Decembru kad ste pricali ne istine ASL.
Evo ako neko kupi CTN ja necu nista komentarisati 1 mesec sto niste naveli nekoga ko ce baciti svoje pare u CTN.
INN-NS
+1 INN
DeleteINN you do not have to comment every single day about ASL getting the airbus 330. I think this is the 5th or 6th time you said it. Lets wait and see now
DeleteQatar
DeleteSingapore (thay do shop)
Thai
Hainan
Air China
China Airlines
China Southern
ANA
Asiana
Delta (let us not forget that they bougth Virgin and desperatly need feeder for LHR)
Turkish
Air France (because of ADPI in Zagreb airport and they do buy)
British (after Iberia and Vueling they could by something 2 hours from LHR and MAD)
And if last three show interest than Lufthansa will start to fight
1. Delta is not desperate for LHR feed. If they really were then they wouldn't be adding new frequencies and destinations.
Delete2. IAG is not looking for anything new two hours from LHR and MAD especially not in the Balkans since Vueling has recently opened a hub in Rome and they have been expanding rather aggressively.
3. Both Air France and KLM are looking for ways to reduce losses so the last thing they need is a new loss making carrier. On top of all that, Air France is restructuring its regional network while KLM has announced a cost cutting programme worth 700 million Euros.
If Lufthansa was to start fighting then it wouldn't be to buy OU but rather to expand in Croatia via its lowcost branch, Germanwings.
Jedino od tih svih navedenih moze jedino
DeleteHU ili OZ su mozda potencialni kupci .
DL ce ih kupiti jedino ko hoce da se igraju sa parama ako imaju viska.
Pa najbolje da ih kupi TK pa da prodhu ko JA .
Ja sam ponovo spomenuo to kad dolazi zato sto sam bio prozvan.
INN-NS
Па шта ако си прозван? Јел мораш да наседаш на сваку прозивку, дај сабери се.
DeletePersonally, if any airline is to buy OU i would say A3. Same fleet, same (similar) market, same hubbing structure, same alliance, both carriers in the EU, same and similar in many ways.
DeleteNaah there is no reason for Aegean to go for OU, especially not since they are planning a major expansion all throughout the Hellenic world.
DeletePlus, investing and expanding beyond their home territory has never been their thing. They are a very conservative airline. Just look how long it took them to detach themselves from Lufthansa and to start building a hub in Athens.
OT: Art community is interested in restarting Gallery over the Atlantic when Air Serbia commences flights to the US. Gallery over the Atlantic was art auction exclusive to JU flights to the USA in the eighties. Leading Yu artists of that time had paintings auctioned off at 33 thousand feet during this unique annual event.
ReplyDeleteIt will not happen. The current management doesn't want anything that resembles old Jat/JAT. That's one of the main reasons why they are no longer printing the popular calenders.
DeleteAir Serbia goals of flying to New York, Chicago and Toronto does resemble old JAT.
DeleteIn that case, lets go crazy and say the entire JU network because hey, it resembles the old JAT.
DeleteThe Gallery thing will be an interesting thing to bring back, however I have a feeling EY will influence its own service into the JU trans atlantic flights. Watch out for onboard chefs and dine on demand in business.
I was just quoting JU management, that's what I heard from them. Like it or not that's the reality.
DeleteYes, they are looking to move away from the JAT image, from uniforms to the rebranding etc. The biggest issue is removing the B733, which is why the Aviolet brand was created, not the destinations they intend to serve.
DeleteYes but thing with JAT has become Dane's obsession at this point. It was especially horrible in the beginning.
Delete