Originally Posted by
irishguy28
Exactly. If they ditched the Virgin brand (and I really struggle to see why they would do so), the only other realistic option is to create some hybrid name that signals the Delta and/or Air France ownership. But they couldn't just go and call it Delta, surely, particularly on the basis that Delta can never own more than 49% of it, and "Delta" as an entity is therefore somewhat separate?
VS announced today that, as expected, their shorthaul network will be operated, as a wet lease, by Aer Lingus. EI will have 4 A320s reconfigured in Virgin livery and the staff will wear Virgin uniforms. A deal, for 3 years, has been signed.
Interesting that they got this piece of news out today, seemingly only days before the news about a change in the ownership structure. Otherwise, we might have seen CityJet (perhaps?) called in to operate a Virgin shorthaul "network" once more! (CityJet operated DUB-LCY in Virgin colours in its very early days, long before it had any affiliation with Air France).
Totally agree. Indeed, it couldn't be 'Delta' or 'Air France' because this will remain a distinct airline, DL and AF will (if it goes ahead) get some shares and presumably, some existing stakeholders will keep them without selling - in any case I don't think there would be a strong case for a fusion.
I think that Cityjet crew operating would be potentially tricky. First, they are not certified to fly A320s and using ARJs would be a waste of slots, second AF is apparently trying to sell WX so selling them just to give them more work would seem a bit counter-intuitive to me. However, more to the point, we all remember that EI is for sale, that FR failed to get it in the conditions that they wanted, and that there are long standing rumours of some increasingly marital love story between EY, EI, AF, DL, AB and more in whichever order so it remains to be seen whether there are yet more pieces of the jigsaw that are going to be progressively revealed...