Bankrupt Airberlin operated its last flight Oct 27 from Munich to Berlin Tegel. The final Airbus A320 flight carried 178 passengers. The airline ceases operations officially Oct 28, ending nearly 39 years of service. Last-minute negotiations with both Condor and EasyJet on the transfer of assets continue, but many Airberlin aircraft are expected to be grounded at least temporarily. With the grounding, the German aviation system will lose 60,000 passengers seats and 250 flights every day. As Airberlin ceases operations, both Berlin airports—Tegel and Schoenefeld—are temporarily expecting fewer passengers, but “In a few weeks, all the [former Airberlin] slots will be allocated and the Berlin airports will have no growth-reduction in the long run,” said Brandenburg Airport MD Engelbert Lütke Daldrup. <br/>
oneworld
EasyJet says it has reached an agreement with Air Berlin to buy parts of the bankrupt airline as part of a E40m (US$46m) deal. The British airline said Saturday that it will acquire "certain assets of the air transport business operated from the Berlin-Tegel airport, including the related slots and bookings." German news agency dpa reported that EasyJet would take over 25 Airbus A320 planes. Air Berlin ended operations after 38 years with a Friday evening Munich-to-Berlin flight. Lufthansa, plans to take over more than half its fleet but that deal has yet to win antitrust clearance. Air Berlin had some 8,000 employees. Lufthansa expects to take on up to 3,000 of them. <br/>
IAG said Friday that Q3 net profit hit a record level and underpinned its strong summer performance by promising investors a 20% jump in full-year earnings. Net income reached E1b (US$1.17b) for the busy July-to-September flying period from E930m the previous year. The group's more closely-watched figure for operating profit before one-time items advanced 21% to E1.46b after sales grew 2% to E6.62b. IAG said it should deliver record operating profit for the full-year of around EUR3b. The group had previously promised investors it would improve on its 2016 pre-exceptional items operating profit of E2.5b by a double-digit percentage figure. CE Willie Walsh said that the group's "commercial performance was good despite underlying disruption from severe weather and terrorism." <br/>
IAG struggled to raise ticket prices at the same pace as rivals as the airline group boosts long-haul budget options to counter tougher competition on its core US routes. Gains in passenger unit revenue slowed to 2.2% in Q3 from a 4% jump in the 3 months through June. The increase was less than half the growth rate at Lufthansa. “There may be an adverse short-term reaction to the unit revenue trend,” with weakening pricing for North America and a poor comparison versus Lufthansa, Gerald Khoo, an analyst at Liberum Capital, wrote in a report to clients. IAG is responding to fast expansion at rival discount long-haul operators, including Norwegian Air Shuttle and Eurowings, by adding capacity at Aer Lingus and the new Level low-cost brand, which flies to the US from Barcelona. <br/>
Qantas chief Alan Joyce says the airline will need to see further improvement in its international business before it can justify ordering more Boeing Dreamliners. The first of 8 787-9 Dreamliners it has on order landed in Australia earlier this month, but Joyce said Friday shareholders expected the "game-changing" aircraft to prove their worth. His comments came as Qantas chairman Leigh Clifford Friday defended his CE's bumper A$25m pay packet in 2017, which was bolstered by shares Joyce was issued 3 years ago and which vested after his successful execution of the airline's $2b turnaround plan. International remains one of the toughest areas of Qantas' business, even as the group's financial fortunes have recovered in recent years. <br/>