Air France-KLM-Alitalia Skyteam

[Fabb]

Dans un communiqué daté de ce lundi, Air France indique que Continental Airlines, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines et Northwest Airlines rejoignent officiellement l'alliance SkyTeam aujourd'hui.

On peut notamment lire dans ledit communiqué que 'avec Continental, KLM et Northwest, SkyTeam compte dorénavant parmi ses membres le premier groupe européen de transport aérien, Air France-KLM'.

L'alliance transporte 341 millions de passagers par an et exploite 14 320 vols quotidiens vers 658 destinations dans 130 pays.

Les trois nouvelles compagnies membres de SkyTeam apportent au réseau de l'alliance dix nouveaux hubs et 141 nouvelles destinations.

[Cyril]

14 320 vols quotidiens !???

[St!ckyesman]

Ça fait pas mal d'avion ça!!!! vous avez une tite idée?

[3tmk]

Continental se ramene chez Skyteam? Ils etaient pas dans un autre groupe?
Tant mieux pour la Skyteam, parcequ'ici aux US, ils n'arretent pas de parler d'une faillite de Delta.

[Phil]

Je crois pas que continental soit beaucoup mieux en forme. Les compagnies américaines sont assez mal en point en général.

Sinon pour assurer 14 320 vols par jour la flotte doit etre super enorme, ça me semble bizarre.

[MyNight]

Aeroméxico, Air France, Alitalia, Continental, CSA Czech Airlines, Delta Air Lines, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, Korean Air et Northwest=Skyteam... Alors, pourquoi pas?...

[Phil]

Oui c'est vrai , en fait j'avais focalisé sur AF-KLM , donc là ça faisait vraiment beaucoup

[3tmk]

surtout que c'est "vols"
Donc je suis certain qu'il y a quelques avions qui font des petit trajets comme Paris-Nice, Rome-Amsterdam, ou bien NYC-Miami 2 fois par jour.

[Phil]

Oui, mais même en comptant 5 vols par jour et par avions, ça fait une flotte de presque 3000 avions, c'est super impressionnant.

[kony]

je viens de lire un article dans un papelard américain qui dit que Delta est au bord de la banqueroute...United , elle , a déjà franchi le cap du fameux Chapter 11 (elle vient d'y entrer pour la 2ème fois en 3 ans !!).

Ici se déclarer en faillite (chapter Eleven) n'a pas la même connotation qu'en France...ici ils se mettent en faillite pour mieux épurer les dettes et repartir du bon pied.

En France "faillite" = la honte pour toi, t'a raté ton coup, t'a plus que tes yeux pour pleurer et les huissiers pour te consoler !

[Fabb]

Originally Posted by Phil

Oui, mais même en comptant 5 vols par jour et par avions, ça fait une flotte de presque 3000 avions, c'est super impressionnant.

Oui, mais je pense qu'ils doivent avoir des tas de petits avions régionaux.

Aux EU, il y a même des vols qui relient les aéroports de LA !
Et puis, il y a les navettes du type NY-Boston par exemple (chez Delta, c'est une sous-entité quio porte le nom de Delta Shuttle).

[gun57]

Originally Posted by kony

United , elle , a déjà franchi le cap du fameux Chapter 11 (elle vient d'y entrer pour la 2ème fois en 3 ans !!).

t'es sur que c'est pas american airlines plutot ?

[Fabb]

J'ai pourtant l'intuition que kony s'y connaît bien en compagnies aériennes...

[gun57]

j'ai l'intuition aussi que j'aurais mieux fais de me taire

[kony]

ben gun57 , en tout cas c'est United et ses pbs qui sont dans l'actualité en ce moment, c'est pourquoi j'ai cité cet exemple...mais dans l'article auquel je faisais référence ils disaient que d'autres compagnies américaines connaissent/connaitront/ont connu des problèmes...donc le tour d'Américan Airlines ne doit pas être loin...


Attends une seconde...soudain j'ai un doute :c'est peut-être US AIR qui était cité dans l'article et non United

Enfin bref, ça va très mal dans le ciel car les compagnies ont du faire face à plusieurs zones de turbulence (hausse du prix du carburant, compagnies low-cost, frein aux voyages dus aux contrôle excessifs dans les aéroports, crise mondiales etc...).

Et les pronostics annoncent (déjà depuis un moment) que les restructurations actuellement en cours , de par le monde (genre regroupement Air-France KLM) aboutiront à terme à la fin des "compagnies nationales" au profit d'une poignée (5 ou 6) grands groupes aéronautique dans le monde !!

Donc chaque compagnie choisis son camp et fourbit ses armes !

[Phil]

Je serai curieu de voir comment les lowcosts vont s'integrer dans ces alliances sur le long terme.

[3tmk]

j'ai vu une emission sur CNN il y a quelque jours parlant justement des problemes des majors, et la concurence des low-costs, mais ils on fait un bon point a la fin, c'est que les low-costs type Jetblue ne peuvent pas relier des trajets des longue distance. C'est trop cher par exemple pour eux de faire un NYC-Londres, donc ceci restera toujours pour les grandes companies.
Mais de toute facon Boeing et Airbus arrivent toujours a vendre leurs stock, meme si c'est en solde

[Electron]

Originally Posted by kony

Attends une seconde...soudain j'ai un doute :c'est peut-être US AIR qui était cité dans l'article et non United

definitivement...

[kony]

^ yeees sir !

[Fabb]

Originally Posted by kony

Attends une seconde...soudain j'ai un doute :c'est peut-être US AIR qui était cité dans l'article et non United

Bon, pour mettre tout le monde d'accord, voici l'article paru dans The Economist :

The worst of times
Sep 16th 2004
From The Economist Global Agenda


US Airways has sought bankruptcy protection for the second time in two years, after failing to persuade its unions to sign up to $800m-worth of pay cuts. Other big airlines, such as Delta, may follow suit. The industry has never been in a worse state

THAT US Airways filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy at the weekend is hardly a surprise. America’s seventh-largest airline had given warning since the spring that it could be forced to seek court protection from its creditors if it failed to gain labour-union approval for a strategic overhaul that would turn it into a discount airline. That approval failed to come after feuding factions in the pilots' union—which had conceded deep pay cuts after the company’s first spell in chapter 11 two years ago—blocked a vote on the issue.

The pilots may have shot themselves in the foot: company managers may now ask the court to let them simply impose the disputed conditions on the pilots. And, unlike last time, liquidation is more likely than not. US Airways has virtually no free assets that could act as collateral for any new loan.

This summer has been a dreadful one for America’s airlines. Cut-throat competition from discount carriers—including newcomers like JetBlue as well as the established Southwest—has combined with high fuel prices to generate whopping losses: more than $23 billion since 2001. As a result, US Airways is only one of several large airlines facing oblivion. It may soon be joined in bankruptcy by Delta Air Lines, America’s third-largest carrier.

US Airways had been the first big airline to seek chapter 11 protection after the September 11th 2001 hijackings that clobbered the industry. It used its court protection to slash its debt and leasing costs and to cut overall annual costs by $1.9 billion. However, the savings have not been enough, and the airline said earlier this year that it would turn itself into a low-cost, no-frills outfit in a bid to keep flying. It would seek $1.5 billion in total cost savings from the transformation, with $800m coming out of wage costs. But the unions, exhausted and disillusioned that the previous concessions they had offered were not enough, refused.

The very fact that US Airways is known to have little chance of coming out of bankruptcy this time will make some customers slow to book flights. And the airline will be unable to continue to lease several small jets that were, thanks to lower running costs and lower pilot pay, a key part of its new low-cost strategy. The airline has been left with virtually no borrowing capacity: it owes $718m to the Air Transportation Stabilisation Board, a federal agency that was set up after the September 11th attacks to support struggling airlines; and General Electric’s aircraft-leasing arm is exposed to the tune of some $3 billion.

US Airways has said it will stop making payments to its pension fund. United Airlines, which is also in chapter 11, has already—controversially—suspended its pension payments. The airlines have little incentive to continue contributing to the funds as their liabilities would, in extremis, be picked up by the federal pensions agency. This is proving problematic for policymakers. Some in Congress think that a shake-up of the industry, including the closure of less viable airlines, is long overdue. But they worry about the billions of dollars in liability that this would dump on the pensions agency, harming healthier members of the scheme. A report by the Centre on Federal Financial Institutions, published on Monday, gave warning that the pensions agency would run out of money by 2020 if current trends persist. The agency said in June that the airline and steel industries had accounted for more than 70% of claims since it started offering insurance in 1974.

Delta has already complained about the difficulties of competing with a company that does not make pension contributions. It is worried that some of its 2,000 pilots aged over 50 might seek early retirement sooner rather than later, in order to secure a lump-sum payment that some perceive to be under threat. Early retirements have been running ahead of average at Delta this year, and the airline is worried that if they rise too high, it may have to leave some jets that fly profitable routes on the tarmac.

Delta has its own radical plans to stay airborne. While it proposes, like US Airways, to cut costs—by an annual $5 billion, with 7,000 jobs going—it wants to increase its long-haul and international flights and is upgrading airline cabins to include leather seats and fancy lights. But Gerald Grinstein, Delta’s 72-year-old boss, will have his work cut out to sell the package to his staff, especially since it includes sizeable pay and health-care cuts. Delta's situation is so dire that Deloitte & Touche, its auditors, have written to the airline warning that they may not be able to certify it as a “going concern”.

While US Airways and Delta are the most vulnerable of America’s airlines, all of the old-style, full-service carriers are under pressure. American Airlines, Continental and United (as well as US Airways) have all followed Northwest’s lead in charging an “administration fee” of $5 to buy tickets by phone and $10 to buy at the airport (compared to nothing for web-based sales) in an effort to stem their losses.

In Europe too, many of the traditional airlines are struggling with deflated revenues and inflated costs. This week, Alitalia, Itay’s deeply troubled flag-carrier, finally persuaded its pilot and ground-crew unions to sign up to salary cuts and job losses. However, its fate still rests on negotiations about similar cuts with cabin-crew representatives, scheduled for Thursday afternoon. On both sides of the Atlantic, the industry’s old guard are finding that without such savings they will fall to ground.