Future of Thomas Cook’s Condor uncertain

In an attempt to further compete with Lufthansa, Air Berlin had considered taking over the charter airline Condor owned by Thomas Cook. These plans have been temporarily put on hold which is forcing Thomas Cook to look at other options. Air Berlin announced the deal last September and said the resulting halt of the deal was due to the poor economy and the ever rising cost of fuel.

Geoff Van Klaveren who is an analyst with Exane BNP said of the scrapped deal between Air Berlin and Codor that “This was a very obvious decision to take. They have got a lot of problems at the moment and they didn’t want to make them worse.”

Klaveren went on to say “Air Berlin has been struggling with LTU. LTU is mostly long-haul and demand for long-haul leisure is now declining. People are choosing short-haul holidays instead. It seemed pretty unlikely it would want to go ahead and take on Condor, which also has a lot of long-haul leisure. From Thomas Cook’s point of view they wouldn’t have been getting much back. They would have effectively been giving away Condor.”

Air Berlin released a statement that said “Both Air Berlin and Thomas Cook are interested in exploring other options. The parties involved intend to continue their discussions.”

Recent news suggests that Thomas Cook’s Condor could join in negotiations with TUIfly and Geramnwings which are attempting to merge. At this point all three airlines are declining comment on the merger talks.

www.condor.com
www.airberlin.com
www.tuifly.com