Alaska Air Group said Wednesday it completed its $2.6b acquisition of Virgin America Inc to become the fifth-largest US carrier. The four big US airlines by passenger traffic are American Airlines Group Inc, Delta Air Lines Inc, United Airlines Inc and Southwest Airlines Co, following years of consolidation within the industry and carrier mergers. Last week, Alaska Air won US antitrust approval for its acquisition of Virgin America on the condition that it would scale back its code-sharing with American Airlines. Under the settlement with the Justice Department, the companies would be banned from code-sharing on routes where Virgin and American Airlines now compete. Code-sharing is also barred on routes that Alaska might start in the future if American also flies them. CFRA Research analyst Jim Corridore said Alaska's acquisition of the cost-sensitive California-based carrier would probably lead to higher fares for consumers in the long run.<br/>
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A human rights group is hoping to persuade travelers from Boston and other cities to avoid flying on Qatar's state-owned airline when going to the Middle East as international attention focuses on the tiny country leading up to its hosting of the 2022 World Cup. The Washington-based Alliance for Workers Against Repression Everywhere is stepping up its push for a boycott of Qatar Airways because of what it alleges are human rights violations by the country and the airline. Qatar Airways is one of the fastest-growing airlines in the world, known for its luxury service and fleet of new aircraft. This year it launched service from several major US cities, including Boston, Atlanta and Los Angeles. In those cities, AWARE ran a public campaign using billboard ads, op-ed pieces and social media to urge travelers to boycott the airline. The group cites the country's poor record on women's rights and gay rights and reports of poor working conditions for a large population of migrant workers who are building stadiums, roads, hotels and other infrastructure in Qatar as the country gets ready to host soccer's World Cup. An Amnesty International report this year said migrant workers reported living in squalid conditions, having their payments withheld for months and having their passports confiscated. Qatar Airways declined to comment on the boycott on Wednesday. But in an interview with Global Atlanta in June, the airline's senior vice president in charge of customer experience, Rossen Dimitrov, called the allegations made by AWARE "patently false."<br/>
Budget airline VietJet is set to raise about $170m in an IPO that will value Vietnam's only private airline at $1.2b, people close to the deal said Wednesday, in the latest in a string of Vietnamese share sales. VietJet Aviation JSC, founded in 2007 by Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao - now Vietnam's first female billionaire - will add its name to a list of coming and completed sales that includes Vietnam Airlines, brewer Sabeco and dairy Vinamilk. VietJet will sell 44.7m shares priced just below the middle of their 75,900 to 98,400 dong ($3.34 to $4.33) marketed range, four people said. The price for institutional buyers will be 84,400 dong each, the people said. One of them told Reuters that the price for retail investors would be 86,500 dong. An overallotment option would not be exercised, the people told IFR. One of the people told Reuters that the offer was oversubscribed.<br/>
Peach Aviation, the Japanese no-frills carrier, will launch the first non-stop air link between Bangkok and Okinawa in February. The route, which was first mulled by the airline back in 2013, is set to become reality with its maiden flight from the southern Japanese island city on Feb 19. According to the Osaka-based airline, it will offer three flights a week on the route, which represents its first activity in Southeast Asia. Bangkok will be Peach's first port of call in Southeast Asia. The airline also envisions flights to Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi. Singapore and Kuala Lumpur are out of the running as they lie beyond the four-hour flying radius from Okinawa, beyond the range of the Airbus 320-200 jets in Peach's fleet. <br/>