Is ANOTHER Delta Investment "going in the tank" ?

[topDawg]

Sheesh. Did you give WT your login & password?...

I'm starting to think you are him.

Tell you what E.
lets make this simple, why don't you give me a call when wall street starts agreeing with you.
See you when American makes up 15 billion worth of ground..........(but they may want to start going in the positive direction)

You're the one who said "​dumped it shortly after the merger" with regard to LH/B6, but now want to couch it as "nothing happens overnight"... The fact is they made the investment strictly as an investment, not for strategic alignment with B6 or for marketing purposes.

alright whatever. You are trying to run away from my overall point, because you are wrong.

BA's investment in Comair goes back some 20 years. Who have they invested in lately that they aren't intent on fully controlling?

once again you are running from what you said. You said they didn't do it, I give examples and now you are tossing horse crap like time limits or percents or size to try to make your point. How very Doug Parker of you.

How about LH?

Brussels? AeroLogic?

Do keep drinking the Koolaid, Dawg. And keep listening to DL management.

You are hitting the American harder than most people I have ever seen as of late. Mixed with 1990s way of thinking from management.

Delta is trying not to go bankrupt. I know that is a stupid idea for someone like yourself but I personally enjoy it.
I suspect the market may be turning here in the future, wanna bet who is going to be hurting more? 5 bucks to any charity.

 

[FrugalFlyerv2.0]

once again you are running from what you said. You said they didn't do it, I give examples and now you are tossing horse crap like time limits or percents or size to try to make your point. How very Doug Parker of you.
Brussels? AeroLogic?

 
Dawg,
 
LH initially bought 45% of SN Airholding (owner of Brussels Airlines) with the option to buy the remaining 55%. 
The time for LH to acquire the remaining 55% has been extended due to the March terrorist attacks.
http://www.luchtzak.be/airlines/brussels-airlines/lufthansa-brussels-airlines-another-view/
http://www.ch-aviation.com/portal/news/45896-lufthansa-defers-brussels-airlines-takeover-decision
 
If LH wasn't interested in acquiring the rest of SN I'd imagine they would have walked away, and the perfect opportunity was this March. 
 
AeroLogic is a joint venture between DHL Express and LH Cargo.  DHL Express itself is a division of Deutsche Post DHL, the courier company, which itself it 20% owned by the German gov. 
So LH Cargo can't buy the 50% it doesn't own if it isn't for sale.
 
I still think that this is a different strategy than DL (wholly owned subsidiaries vs. buying a % of an airline).  Time will tell if DLs investments in airlines in Europe, South America and Asia will work out.

 

[commavia]

Arguably, DL could have gotten just about all of the revenue benefits from an alliance/JV with Virgin without the investment.

AA and BA have no cross investments, neither do UA & LH.

The only airlines actively investing in other airlines that they don't plan to merge with are are Etihad, Delta, and Hainan.

If it were such a great model to follow, I'd think there would be others doing it.

 
Indeed.
 
Foreign investments are yet another dramatic point of strategic departure between Delta and its primary U.S. competitors, particularly AA.  It is quite notable that Delta has felt the need to collectively make investments or assume liabilities in excess of $1.3B in airlines around the world in recent years whereas United has spent a total of $100M and AA has spent $0.
 
This will be yet another interesting comparison to watch in the coming years to see whether one strategy or the other ultimately proves more successful.

 

[topDawg]

Dawg,
 
LH initially bought 45% of SN Airholding (owner of Brussels Airlines) with the option to buy the remaining 55%. 
The time for LH to acquire the remaining 55% has been extended due to the March terrorist attacks.
http://www.luchtzak.be/airlines/brussels-airlines/lufthansa-brussels-airlines-another-view/
http://www.ch-aviation.com/portal/news/45896-lufthansa-defers-brussels-airlines-takeover-decision
 
If LH wasn't interested in acquiring the rest of SN I'd imagine they would have walked away, and the perfect opportunity was this March.

I don't believe LH has said they will or won't buy the rest. They may.
IMO if Delta could buy all of Aeromexico and Virgin they would. Its not an ideal world.
and in the case of GOL and China Eastern, Delta is going to be able to show them how to become a more global airline. If you haven't ever flown China Eastern then you don't know how bad the product is, Delta's goal is to help them improve the product.

and for GOL, watch them very carefully over the next few months. Some interesting ideas being tossed around with them.....
 

AeroLogic is a joint venture between DHL Express and LH Cargo.  DHL Express itself is a division of Deutsche Post DHL, the courier company, which itself it 20% owned by the German gov. 
So LH Cargo can't buy the 50% it doesn't own if it isn't for sale.

Just like Delta can't buy the other parts of the carriers they are investing it.
but still missing my overall point. Delta and Eithad aren't the only airlines who own pieces of other airlines. It might be from JVs. It might be from 100 years ago. It might be for whatever reason, but it still happens a good bit in the industry.
It doesn't happen in the US industry a lot but Delta isn't trying to be American. It isn't trying to be United. All you have to do is look at the things Delta has been doing lately to see they are trying to change the way they operate and make the business a little more stable. Part of that is having control over a lot of things.

If we went by what people like you and E are saying is right, people like me would be jobless as Delta shuts down its in-house operations likes TechOps. More importantly Delta is showing us every day that things like TechOps, DMS(Delta Material Services) etc are working. Check out Delta's maintenance CASM vs the new shinny jet fleet of American. (hint, Delta's is lower)

 

I still think that this is a different strategy than DL (wholly owned subsidiaries vs. buying a % of an airline).  Time will tell if DLs investments in airlines in Europe, South America and Asia will work out.

Of course it is to a point. Delta can't buy all of Aero, GOL, Virgin etc. Its not legal for them to do so. IMHO if they could Delta would.

 

[Kev3188]

Sheesh. Did you give WT your login & password?...

 

I'm starting to think you are him.

 

 

[metopower]

Why because he isn't as negative as you are

 

[eolesen]

After seeing all the fireworks over the Fox Theater and DL's "exclusive" sponsorship of the Pride Parade in SEA, I think it's safe to say that the DL management team isn't perfect.

If anyone things the Chinese carriers are going to follow DL's lead, they've never actually studied Chinese airlines very closely. I spent half a year shuttling between CZ and MU HDQ's, and what they expect from DL & Skyteam vs. what DL thinks they can get from the Chinese are about as far apart ideologically as you can possibly get.

 

[metopower]

After seeing all the fireworks over the Fox Theater and DL's "exclusive" sponsorship of the Pride Parade in SEA, I think it's safe to say that the DL management team isn't perfect.If anyone things the Chinese carriers are going to follow DL's lead, they've never actually studied Chinese airlines very closely. I spent half a year shuttling between CZ and MU HDQ's, and what they expect from DL & Skyteam vs. what DL thinks they can get from the Chinese are about as far apart ideologically as you can possibly get.

What DL wants is coordination on connecting traffic in PVG. Looks like it is working to me. 4 flights a day from PVG with connection traffic beyond.How much traffic did you generate from cz or mu ? DL is in the same terminal with all the skyteam airlines which is the old domestic terminal that is being remodeled into dual use terminal.

 

[eolesen]

Sure, CZ and MU have no problem with the feed from DL. They're marking up the fares by 20-50% for the privilege of being able to book as an interline vs. what you pay as a walk-up or thru a Chinese booking site.

The bigger point is that neither carrier will ever change their service standards to a level that DL's uber-elites will accept as comparable.

Nor are they going to stop undercutting DL's pricing for premium cabin, something that those travelers held to a "lowest available" travel policy will not be able to justify an exception to fly on a US carrier.

Heck, even on DL's metal, MU is charging less for walk-up J on LAX-PVG. In routes where it's their own metal, the differential is even worse.

When I was commuting to China, it was usually $2500 for MU or CZ vs. $3500 on DL. Fortunately, we had a killer discount with CX, so I didn't have to deal with either DL or MU/CZ even though we were working for them.

 

[commavia]

As reported last night by the Wall Street Journal, Delta is also now reportedly looking into acquiring part or all of another foreign airline - this time Avianca.
 
Interesting ...

 

[FrugalFlyerv2.0]

As reported last night by the Wall Street Journal, Delta is also now reportedly looking into acquiring part or all of another foreign airline - this time Avianca.
 
Interesting ...

 
I think United is interested in Avianca as well.
Bidding war?

 

[topDawg]

 
I think United is interested in Avianca as well.
Bidding war?

 
a bunch of airlines are looking into it at the moment. 
 
back in the day we were really close to Avianca. Wouldn't be crazy to me if they wanted to leave star with Copa being in now. 

 

[eolesen]

Nah, Avianca's doing pretty well with Star now, particularly in Brasil.

DL getting into the bidding for AV isn't unexpected, but does call into question confidence on their investment in Gol, since Avianca Brasil is the #3 airline in Brasil after LATAM and Gol.

I also have to wonder how that would sit with AeroMexico, since there's a fair degree of overlap in the feed DL would expect to get from the region.

 

[robbedagain]

I thought I read on yahoo the other day UAL could also enlist the help of LH to help keep Avianca in Star  if it comes down to that 

 

[topDawg]

Nah, Avianca's doing pretty well with Star now, particularly in Brasil.

DL getting into the bidding for AV isn't unexpected, but does call into question confidence on their investment in Gol, since Avianca Brasil is the #3 airline in Brasil after LATAM and Gol.

I also have to wonder how that would sit with AeroMexico, since there's a fair degree of overlap in the feed DL would expect to get from the region.

GOL + Avianca is better than GOL. I do agree with you that Avianca fits in brazil with Star but the overlap up north with Copa is pretty big. 
 
Or could just be Delta playing the bad guy trying to get United or whoever else to pay a higher price. 
 

I thought I read on yahoo the other day UAL could also enlist the help of LH to help keep Avianca in Star  if it comes down to that 

 
There are quite a few names being tossed out. I want to say I saw something that said a China airline was looking to get into it also.