Article in French:http://www.tourmag.com/Tunisair-limi...er_a46840.html

Here's a basic translation on the alliance section:
Since last May, Mohamed Thamri took control of the company Tunisian national who has lived in eventful week directly related to the revolution of Jasmin. Gradually, the order amounts and projects as: making a hub between Europe and Africa in Tunis, is closer to the oneworld alliance and foremost meet the demand for tourism and business in the best conditions.

" TourMaG.com - Is there not an economic logic that Tunisair approaches a large airline alliance? Mohamed Thamri : "Attempts at rapprochement with the Skyteam alliance of Air France did not succeed. Today it makes more sense to find common ground for partnerships with the Oneworld alliance of British Airways / Iberia.'s a possibility which we think. "

Do you think Tunisair is a good addition to OW? Would it mean that OW would gain an African airline?

I guess it's good just to have African carrier in OW. However, their geographical location adds very little to the alliance. Other than TUN, european pax can just fly on an EU carrier to any of TU's destinations.

To overcome their geographic disadvantage and be of any real value, TU needs to operate JFK-TUN, and routes far south into the continent. Luckily, TU's management is already thinking about this with the order of A332's, but with the "Arab spring" still going on I would imagine that plans were pushed back.

For the US, OW really needs a west African airline.

While most any African partner would be welcome, for me OW needs a south African, or preferably South African (with capital S) airline other than Comair/BA.

Forget it. That's NOT going to happen.

umm... the continent is not exactly overflowing with acceptable, let alone quality, airlines. The two best African airlines (SA and KQ) are already in other alliances. I wonder which West African airline you had in mind.
RAM would be rather better than Tunisair, though, to give access to French-speaking West Africa, which is rather poorly served by OW.

At least not until the franchise agreement extension ends in 2018. Besides there are no other airlines to take MN's place.

Well I was thinking about Arik Air(eventually). They are now operating JFK-LOS. However, they do have a number of things to work out, and would need the help that comes from an alliance sponsor.

Interesting, around this time last year they were talking about *A .

(sorry, the only link I have for that story is in French)

http://www.lechotouristique.com/arti...esserait,33595

Sounds like they have tried *A, then tried Skyteam and now they are knocking on OW's door. OW could certainly do with more presence in Africa, but TU don't have a particularly large network. According to a poster on another forum they only serve 6 points in sub Saharan Africa: Niamey ; Nouakchott; Ouagadougou; Abidjan; Bamako; and Dakar ( although their website actually only shows four of those as destinations)

I think the fact that in the last 11 months they have talked about joining *A , then Skyteam and now OW suggests that they are not too sure what they want, and are not highly sought after by any of the alliances.

Very thick network within Nigeria but only a handful outside it and, as you say, they have a few things to 'work out'. I'd take RAM over Arik Air in a heartbeat.

RAM is ok, but they share the same geographic disadvantage as Tunisair. Being so close to MAD puts them in competition with IB on many routes. RAM doesn't even fly to JNB. In this case, an improved Arik would provide more value in covering Nigeria and West Africa.

In addition, OW should seriously look at TAAG Angola. It looks as though they are buying new 777's and have resolved their safety issues with the IATA and EU. They have an decent sized network in southern Africa, along with routes to Brazil, Dubai, and Bejing.

Which routes? IB has very few routes to Africa. The only ones I would imagine there would be competition with RAM would be DKR, LOS and SSG. (Admittedly, there would be competion on routes to Morocco itself but I would imagine that IB would in fact benefit from increased traffic on its Moroccan routes if RAM was in OW)

For Nigeria itself, Arik certainly wins. But for the rest of West Africa, RAM is infinitely better: Arik only serves 6 non-domestic destinations in West Africa (ACC,COO,ROB, FNA, BJL, DKR). By comparison, RAM serves 20 (NKC, DKR, BKO, CKY, ACC, NIM, OUA, ABJ, DLA, LBV, BZV, SSG, BJL, NSI, LOS, BGF, PNR,FNA, ROB, FIH).
In addition, RAM serves 8 destinations in North Africa and the Middle East (ALG, TUN, TIP, CAI, BEY, JED, RUH, AUH). Arik serves none.
Arik serves one destination in Europe (LON). RAM serves over 20.
Arik serves one destination in North America (NYC). RAM serves 2 (NYC and YUL).
It is true that RAM has no flights at all to Southern Africa whereas Arik serves JNB. IMO, this would be an easier gap to plug than compensating for the extremely limited international network of Arik.

Have they? I thought that they were still on the banned EU list (except for 3 B777s and 4 B737s).

[QUOTE=NickB;17160064]Which routes? IB has very few routes to Africa. The only ones I would imagine there would be competition with RAM would be DKR, LOS and SSG. (Admittedly, there would be competion on routes to Morocco itself but I would imagine that IB would in fact benefit from increased traffic on its Moroccan routes if RAM was in OW)

Yes, I know AT serves more locations, but they're location makes for a poor intra-African hub. Its similar to LHR being a geographically poor location for intra-EU travel, and the reason OW chose AB to join the alliance. If there were a viable airline in the Central African Republic, that would be the ideal location for an African partner. Given the poor viability of the other central African nations, Nigeria is the next best thing.

When you combine a good geographic location with a potential market nearly five times the size of Morocco's, Nigeria is a must.

As I said previously, Arik will need some nurturing from one of the bigger OW members, but the strategic potential is far greater than in Morocco. Besides, I see no reason why both airlines couldn't be in OW.

Europe is well covered, by AY, AB,BA, and IB. What OW needs is an intra continent network.

What concerns me more is the fact that AA still has no flights to Africa while DL keeps expanding.

As of 2010 they were allowed to resume 777 and 737 operations to all of Europe, but under strict conditions. TAAG also has the permission to fly US-Angola routes as well.

Commission updates the list of airlines banned from the European airspace

"
The Commission recognises the improvements in the operations of TAAG Angola Airlines by allowing the air carrier to operate under certain strict conditions with specific aircraft to all destinations in the EU, not only to Lisbon."

AT (RAM) has shares owned by both AF and IB, though AF has more, so I guess it would be hard for AT (RAM) to join OW.

AF only owns 2.86% of AT, while the Moroccan govt owns 95.95%. So AF is hardly in any position to dictate which alliance AT joins.

The govt is planning on selling 25% of AT in the future, but even if AF brought those shares they still wouldn't have the ability to determine AT's alliance.