What qualifies an airline to be in *A?
 

I was wondering -- what allows an airline to become a member of star alliance? For example, when an airline like BM or Ansett joins (which already had some cooperation agreements with UA), what wasn't it doing before that now allows it to be a member of the club?

Is it sharing the reservation system? Agreement on fare levels? Or is it new training for crew and agents? Minimum service standards?

Anyone know?

British Midland
Lufthansa and Scandinavian Airlines, having 40% of British Midland shares now, promoted this.

Austrian Airlines Group (includes Lauda and Tyrolian)
Lufthansa convinced Austrian's board to leave the Qualiflier Group and integrated the Austrian-Group-airlines into their miles&more-frequent-flier-program.

in General UA and LH rule StarAlliance, others have more of a veto-right only ...

I also think hub acquisitions have something to do with it. Austrian really wants to turn Vienna into a large regional hub (I wouldn't mind, since it's an awesome city), and I think both UAL and LH can benefit greatly from that. Other than that, Rudi's right...those 2 rule and dictate just about everything.

The simple answer is, "Agreement of the other members allows a new member to join."

The more complex question is, "What considerations do the members want to take in new members."

To my way of thinking, there's a range of issues:

1) Comparability. If you bring in a carrier you want to ensure that it offers a level of service which is comparable to the other members.

2) Network needs. A "global" network must cover the globe. The basics are mandatory: a strong US anchor, a top rank European carrier, and a top rank Asian carrier.

3) Avoidance of duplication. Alliance partners should not have to slug it out. (This is what fuels the rumours of TG being courted by SkyTeam).

4) Cost benefit. Every revenue passenger km you feed to an alliance partner should be balanced by revenue passenger km being fed from the carrier. In addition, every revenue passenger km you feed out of the network, is an opportunity lost.

5) Willingness and ability to cooperate. Airlines participate in other ways, such as joint purchasing.

6) Optimization. Too few carriers and you don't offer a network or range of service that is attractive enough. Too many carriers, and the demands on individual areas can prevent delivery of services.

Each of these issues is relative. Some might question the comparability of, say, BD and SQ, but, domestic British traffic has to go somewhere. Better in the club than out. Similarly, Africa is not well covered, other than through FRA. But would Ethiopian really be a welcome addition? (Actually as African carriers go, they're not bad, but that is, after all, a relative statement).

It seems clear that * considers its present size to be just about right, as they move from an expansion mode, to a cooperation mode. With 13 carriers (15, actually, if you include all three Austrian brands), there are only two additions I can see coming down the pipe: CP (if only as it gets merged into AC), and EK (there is a big hole in the network in the Gulf, and Emirates would be a huge coup). Beyond that, the world is pretty much covered.

Well just today LH announced, that they will strengthen their cooperation with Quatar Airways. Maybe this is some hint, who will join * in the Gulf region if Emirates wouldn't join (or fit). Don't know if Qatar has a strong presence in Africa, too.

Could you expand on these excellent explanations a bit more? For example, UA has Saudi Arabian Airlines as a partner right now, but what is preventing that airline from joining Star Alliance?

Does membership in *A imply a committment to certain minimum levels of passenger traffic between carriers, not just within that carrier itself? (for example, an airline has to show that its passengers will use not only its own service, but those of UA, LH, etc.?)

Rudi

FYI, LH owns 20% of BD and SK owns a further 20% (SK sold 50% of it's 40% stake to LH). The balance of the 60% in BD is owned by Sir Michael whatsisname and a incorporated partnership he controls.

Saudia does not strike me as a strong addition.

Visa restrictions for the KSA are quite stringent, making Saudia almost useless as a regional carrier for *. If you can't get to Jeddah or Riyadh, then you can't transit there...

In answer to your other question, TA, I doubt that there is any guarantee. But the member carriers will look at the candidate airline, and look at how much of their own traffic within that network they currently feed outside of the network to those destinations.

There will be committments between individual carriers for code-sharing, but these can be fairly revenue neutral exercises.

Absolutely concur with AC*SE's comments above!! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Emirates would be an interesting route network addition. Think that has been mooted?

Well, they only just came out with an FF program. Until that step, it would have been a pretty pointless discussion.

It is noteworthy that UA is a partner on Emirate's program. However the core is Emirates and Air Lanka. I don't think that Air Lanka brings much to the table, and Emirates might not be keen to abandon their new partner quite so soon.

the next StarAlliance partner (jan-1-2000?) will be Canadian

date? porbably early 2001 (may be jan-1-2001) when they merge the frequent flier program into AC's.