AA, DL e UA protestano contro vettori Qatar & UAE per concorrenza sleale

[TW 843]

The ups and downs of reaching an 'understanding' between the US and Gulf airlines

By Alex Lennane 18/05/2018
This week has seen much confusion over the details of the agreement between the US and the UAE carriers.
After an initial White House briefing suggested there was a “routes freeze”, it now states that there is “an understanding” that Emirates and Etihad have no current plans to add fifth freedom rights – although they are entitled to do so under the Open Skies agreement.
The twists and turns of the story have been well reported by ATW, which also notes that the UAE conversation is similar to that with Qatar in January: the Open Skies agreement remains intact, but with an assurance of no planned fifth freedom rights.
Freighter flights are not covered by this ‘understanding’ between the US and the Gulf States, and appear to be at liberty to offer fifth freedom routes.
However, it looks as if Qatar has found a way around the belly capacity understanding. In September, it bought 49% of Meridiana and, with 51% shareholder Alisarda, changed the airline’s name to Air Italy.
Qatar will be leasing aircraft to the Milan-Malpensa based carrier and began a codeshare agreement with it last month.
Air Italy has applied to the US DoT for the transport rights granted to Meridiana, under its new name. These include “foreign scheduled and charter cargo air transportation between any point or points in the United States and any other point or points”.
Qatar Airways already operates a twice weekly 777 freighter service on the Milan-Chicago-Milan route.
Meanwhile Cargo Facts reports yesterday that Qatar Airways is to let its leases on three A330-200Fs expire in early 2019, leaving it with five.
Chief cargo officer Guillaume Halleux said: “I cannot hide the fact that we are considering removing them,” but added: “We have plenty of other options to redeploy aircraft outside of Doha.”
Could any Qatar freighters find their way into Air Italy’s fleet, one wonders? And could Qatar Airways, with access to a European AOC, be able to bypass the ‘understanding’ with the US? We shall see.

https://theloadstar.co.uk/ups-downs-reaching-understanding-us-gulf-airlines/

 

[AZ209]

Il CEO di Delta (Bastian) ha dichiarato che dal prossimo anno torneranno a collegare direttamente Mumbai (BOM) dalla East Coast americana (JFK o ATL).
Un segnale importante visto che il mercato diretto USA-India e' un duopolio UA/AI, il resto e' tutto via golfare e via Europa.
DL operava la rotta in V liberta' da AMS fino al 2015 quando l'ha chiusa dichiarando che la competizione con le golfare rendeva insostenibile la rotta.

 

[13900]

Sono a un forum aziendale e il capo di Strategy ha appena detto che la tariffa-base di UA sul Nord Atlantico é, e cito, "$30 to $40 less than the comparative fare sold on any market by Norwegian".

Poi parliamo di dumping dalle ME3...

 

[East End Ave]

posto qui per non aprire un nuovo thread; anche tra di loro gli americani bisticciano per questioni di concorrenza...in questo caso tra NY e NJ:

FAA ruling on Port Authority suit validates United’s claims
Almost four years ago, United filed a complaint with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) seeking an investigation of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey’s financial practices at EWR. The complaint contended that the Port Authority diverted more than $2 billion from the New York area airports to non-airport uses, including spending on facilities not even operated by the Port Authority. The complaint also noted the Port Authority’s generation of huge surpluses through unreasonable fees and discrimination against carriers serving New Jersey airports.
The FAA began its investigation in 2015, and, yesterday, the FAA issued a determination that the Port charged United unreasonable and discriminatory fees at EWR and illegally diverted money to off-airport projects.
United is pleased to see the FAA take seriously the concerns raised, looks forward to continuing its important work with the Port Authority in pursuit of its shared goal: better service for our customers at EWR.

 

[AZ209]

ANALYSIS: Delta's accusations reignite US-Qatar spat

Any hopes that the spat between US and Gulf carriers was resolved by two governmental agreements announced in 2018 have been all but dashed – in the case of the Qatar at least – by developments in recent weeks.
A strongly worded article by Delta Air Lines chief executive Ed Bastian in the run-up to the festive period contained a list of familiar complaints. He argued that unfair state aid was propping up Qatar Airways, which he described as "one of the worst-performing airlines in the history of the airline industry". He added that the carrier was "giving" Air Italy – in which Qatar Airways holds a 49% stake – "billions of dollars' worth of new airplanes", and suggested that this was to create a proxy for fifth-freedom flights to the USA.
This came after Air Italy on 5 December detailed plans to add services from Milan Malpensa to Los Angeles and San Francisco next summer, and later unveiled plans to begin Chicago flights.
The impact of Air Italy in the Milan-USA market has been huge in terms of the rise in capacity. Italian carriers have gone from accounting for 14% of seats on such services in May 2018 to 63% in May this year – albeit in a market with a relatively small base. The increase is almost completely explained by the extra capacity added by Air Italy through its services to New York, Miami, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Bastian continues: "By flooding these markets with subsidised capacity and dropping prices far below cost, Qatar is launching another assault on US airline employees and travellers, and disrespecting the [Trump] Administration."
His comments followed news earlier in December that several senators had written to US transportation secretary Elaine Chao to express doubts over Qatar Airways' intentions following its acquisition of an Air Italy shareholding in February 2018.
Bastian's article and the actions of senators do not bode well for the apparent truce created by the January 2018 agreement between the governments of Qatar and the USA – followed by one between the UnitedArab Emirates and the USA later in the year – which had appeared to placate American Airlines, Delta and United Airlines. For years they had complained that Gulf carriers were guilty of dumping capacity in the USA under open skies. They also claimed that Emirates, Etihad Airways and Qatar Airways benefited from billions of dollars in government subsidies that enabled their rapid growth.
Notably, the Qatari agreement included a commitment that Qatar Airwayswould not add fifth-freedom flights to the USA.

TRUE INTENTIONS
Regarding that particular issue, Qatar Airways chief executive Akbar Al Baker appeared to be aware that US carriers were unhappy about the developments at Air Italy several months ago – despite his insistence that the relaunched Meridiana was all about challenging Alitalia's dominance.
Speaking to FlightGlobal at the Farnborough air show in July 2018, he said: "I want to make it very clear that [Qatar Airways does] not transfer passengers onto [Air Italy and] we don't codeshare with them from beyond Europe – anywhere. Nor does [Qatar Airways'] network into Italy interfere with the network of Air Italy vis-a-vis the timings."
He explained that he was spelling out these points "to make sure that we are not perceived in any way of using Air Italy [for fifth-freedom flights], because we have signed an agreement with the United States".
As ever with the US-Gulf spat, there is evidence to support both sides of the argument.
In terms of the deployment of on-order aircraft, Air Italy is undeniably a useful outlet for Qatar Airways' capacity as it grapples with the consequences of an ongoing blockade by its Middle Eastern neighbours. Al Baker has insisted, however, that Air Italy is receiving leased aircraft "at market rates".
Flight Fleets Analyzer shows that Air Italy has 16 aircraft in service. Half of them are on lease from Qatar Airways: three Boeing 737 Max 8s and five Airbus A330-200s.
Bastian's article incorrectly suggests Air Italy has taken Boeing 787s from Qatar Airways, although Al Baker has stated that Dreamliners will begin joining the European operator's fleet in 2019. At Air Italy's launch, Al Baker envisaged Air Italy having 20 737-8s and 30 787s – all leased from Qatar Airways – in service by 2022.
Regarding fleet and financial support, Qatar Airways might reasonably note that Delta was less vocal about Etihad's involvement in Alitalia when the US and Italian operator were part of the same transatlantic joint venture.
In network terms, meanwhile, the story in Milan – where Air Italy's rapid expansion has been focused since its relaunch – is a complex one.
On the one hand, Air Italy has undeniably injected a level of capacity into the Milan-USA market that goes well beyond what might be considered "organic" year-on-year growth trends.

In May 2019, FlightGlobal schedules data shows there will be some 166,000 seats on services between Milan and the USA – a 46% rise on the 114,000 seats available in the same month of 2018, and a 60% rise on the 105,000 seats in May 2017.
Air Italy accounts for around 49,000 of the seats in May 2019, all of which were new to the market year-on-year.
Countering Bastian's claims that this amounts to "dumping", however, is the fact that Milan has arguably been ripe for expansion by an Italian carrier for some time, particularly in a market where the local flag carrier tends to veer from one crisis to the next.
Indeed, only in 2019 will seats available on Milan-USA flights exceed the high seen in 2007, before Alitalia significantly rowed back on its presence in the Italian city as it prepared for a relaunch in combination with now-defunct Italian operator Air One.
The numbers are stark. Amid Alitalia's relaunch and the global economic crisis, seats on Milan-USA routes dropped from 1.52 million in the year to end-May 2007 to just 693,000 in the 12 months to end-May 2012.

In the 12 months to end-May 2019, seats will exceed the 2007 level for the first time since, at 1.63 million.
What is particularly striking about the big Italian markets is the relatively small part played by local carriers. At Milan's airports, for example, just 14% of seats on US routes were provided by an Italian carrier – in this case Alitalia – in May 2018. That figure rises to 63% in May 2019, reflecting Air Italy's rapid expansion.
At Alitalia's base city of Rome, 33% of seats on US services will be provided by Italian operators in May 2019.
To put that within the context of Europe’s other hubs, some 69% of seats on US services at Frankfurt's airports are being provided by German carriers in May 2019; on the same basis, local carriers account for 55% of seats in London and 51% in Paris.
Therefore, in terms of historical trends and market opportunities, Air Italy's expansion makes some sense in its own right.

ROUTE LAUNCHES
Bastian is right, however, that Air Italy has not necessarily focused on underserved markets. By far the busiest route from Milan Malpensa is to New York JFK, on which Air Italy competes with Oneworld partner American, Delta, Emirates and Alitalia. United meanwhile operates Malpensa-Newark. All of the services are daily.
Air Italy is also competing with American on Malpensa-Miami, with both offering daily flights. But the Italian operator will be the only carrier flying from Milan to Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
Delta is the only operator serving Malpensa-Atlanta.
Bastian's claims about Qatar Airways' recently poor financial performance meanwhile have some merit, although it is also important to note that the Doha-based carrier has been under force majeure conditions in recent months amid the blockade.
In September it revealed a group pre-tax loss of QR156 million ($43 million) for the year to 31 March 2018, turning in a net loss of more than QR251 million, compared with the previous full-year profit of QR2.9 billion.
The airline noted the year had been "the most challenging" in its history, but cited a "strong" cash position.
It is ultimately difficult to second-guess where this latest setback in US-Gulf relations will lead. But it is clear that both sides have sufficiently entrenched positions to make an easy resolution unlikely. FG

 

[Viking]

L’arroganza americana equivale alla loro ignoranza: dire che air Italy appartiene a Qatar equivale a dire che il 49% è > del 51%. tra un po’ chiederanno una risoluzione all’onu.