Rami Levy makes a NIS 70 million offer to purchase Israir Airlines

Israeli businessmen Rami Levy and Shalom Haim have submitted a NIS70m (approximately $20.4m) bid for purchasing Israeli airline company Israir Airlines. The offer is considered relatively low, and reflects the financial damages caused to Israir by the coronavirus pandemic. This may lead the current shareholder of Israir Airlines, IDB Group, to decline the offer and wait for the industry to recover and travel restrictions to ease up. The offer was submmited via BGI Investments, which Levy and Haim equally control. As part of the offer, BGI will acquire all shares of Israir Airlines for NIS70mi, while Israir, in turn, would cancel a NIS17m ($5m) debt that current shareholder, IDB Group, owes it. The current offer is perceived by some as a low starting bid, especially because Israir is considered to be in good momentum. While the company's revenues have been dramatically dropping since March, it remained operational the entire time, as opposed to Israeli airlines El Al and Arkia, which stopped all of their activity after the pandemic broke out.<br/>