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Virgin Atlantic
has warned that British Airway's third attempt to tie-up with American Airlines would create a monster monopoly that
it claims would push up ticket prices and substantially reduce competition on the busiest air corridor in the world.
Last
week, the three airlines - American Airlines, British Airways and Iberia
- signed a joint business agreement on flights between North America and
Europe with plans to expand their global cooperation.
Sir Richard Branson, President of Virgin Atlantic,
said, "Make no mistake - if this monster monopoly is approved it will be third time
unlucky for consumers. It will still be bad for passengers, bad for competition, and bad for the UK and US aviation industry
"BA argues that the aviation landscape has changed since their last failed application - I disagree, nothing has changed. Open Skies has not
delivered the greater competition that was promised because Heathrow is full. BA/AA and Iberia would still be unacceptably dominant, with
nearly half of all of the slots at Heathrow, leaving competitors powerless to take them on.
"The current economic slowdown is also no justification for agreeing to this alliance. The job of the regulators is to assess the long-term impact
of the alliance on competition, not to provide special protection from the immediate challenges of the economic cycle, with which every other
airline has to deal.
"We are not against consolidation but this alliance is on a scale never seen before. BA/AA with Iberia won’t create fair play - so we say no way
BA/AA."
Virgin
Atlantic outlined its specific concerns:
BA/AA
will form a dominant force in transatlantic markets, with nearly 60% of
all Heathrow - US frequencies. In 2007 62% of passengers traveling
between Heathrow and the US travelled on BA or AA, according to the US
Department of Transport. Existing competitors will struggle to compete
and new entrants will be deterred.
BA/AA
will have 63% of capacity between Heathrow and New York JFK, 79% between
Heathrow and Boston and 75% between Heathrow and Miami. The alliance
would have dominant market shares on other Heathrow routes, 66% to
Chicago and 49% to Los Angeles, and would create a pure monopoly on the
route from Heathrow to Dallas Fort Worth.
BA
and AA have over 200,000 slots a year at London Heathrow. Virgin
Atlantic has 17,000. Heathrow is full and no other carrier can replicate
BA/AA’s network. According to Virgin BA/AA won’t face enough
competition on its huge network to stop it raising prices to consumers.
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