TAROM CEO interview includes comments on Sky Team
 

scroll down a few stories on www.nineoclock.ro

Interesting, what Skyteam really needs is a Central/South American carrier, especially since COPA is certain to leave with CO. I think the alliance has Europe well covered.

It's likely, sure, but is it certain? CO's ownership in COPA is down to 10%.

As of right now, ST has COPA and AeroMexico, and OW has LAN (and soon Mexicana), and there are no Latin American airlines at all in *A. Aerolíneas Argentinas and Varig do not currently belong to any of the three alliances.

Well, COPA uses Onepass as their frequent flyer program. Either they are going to have to dump Onepass or it is going to be an interesting hybrid should they stay in Skyteam.

Any chance AM will take over from CO as "sponsor" of COPA?

Bilateral relationships always matter more than alliance membership...I suspect that the major presence of CO in MX is probably enough to keep Copa part of OnePass for the foreseeable future. It is probably no coincidence that the Copa fleet is rather similar to the CO fleet.

Neither the fleet nor the logo are a coincidence -- CO used to own 51% of Copa. However, since the IPO, CO has reduced that to 10%. As a result, I expect that Copa will be able to make their own decision; if they follow CO, it'll be because they believe it to be the best for Copa, not because CO told them to.

Moving to the Skyteam forum...

slippahs
nwa forum co-moderator

CO sold their remaining shares in Copa in May:

http://investor.shareholder.com/copa...leaseID=311697

Copa's decision would be more around strategic factors now? Would ST or *A provide them with a better feeder network?

Varig is an interesting one, they're now owned by LCC Gol, but any reentry by them into *A might temper Copa switching...

In Latin America, there's also TAM, TACA, Avianca...?