Frontier shakes off Spirit merger disappointment with new vow for low-cost flying

Frontier Group Holdings is targeting capacity growth of up to 20% through the decade, CE Barry Biffle told Reuters, as the budget airline pushes to take a bigger share of the US leisure travel market from rivals amid a weakening economy. From 2024, the Colorado-based carrier is aiming to increase capacity, or the number of seats it offers, by between 10 and 20% a year as it seeks to position itself as America’s budget airline after the recent collapse of a deal to merge with rival Spirit Airlines. JetBlue Airways Corp prevailed over Frontier after a months-long bidding war. Frontier, which is about 82% owned by Bill Franke’s Indigo Partners, had previously told investors it would ramp up capacity this year by as much as 15% above the pre-pandemic level and said it would expand 30% year-on-year in 2023. If Frontier hits the high end of the previously unreported, longer-term growth target, it would emerge as almost the size of 2019-era American Airlines, before COVID-19 sent travel into a steep decline. “We will now be positioned in the market as the only national ultra-low-cost carrier,” Franke told Reuters. Frontier’s merger with Spirit would have created a budget airline behemoth and the fifth- largest airline in the United States.<br/>