The negotiations between the Government and Lufthansa for Ita Airways continue at a rapid pace and there is the will of the parties to speed up and close the agreement as soon as possible, by March. Once the agreement has been signed which will allow the German airline to rise to 40% in Italy, then it will be necessary to wait for the go-ahead from the EU Antitrust which will probably ask for adjustments, such as for example the possible sale of Lufthansa slots to avoid a position that is too dominant. The German group led by Carsten Spohr, sources close to the dossier tell Adnkronos, initially aims to buy 40% for a value between 200-300 million euros, in the form of a capital increase to then go up within two years 100% by purchasing the remaining stake held by the Mef when Lufthansa thinks that Ita will reach break-even.
For Lufthansa, the Fiumicino hub, the same sources point out, will be the fundamental one for connecting the southern hemisphere. In fact, the German airline is very present in the North with hubs in Munich, Frankfurt, Zurich, Vienna and Brussels and Fiumicino will represent the German group’s trump card for developing connections to the South. The intercontinental routes of Ita, therefore, point out the same sources, not only will not be cut but will be significantly expanded looking not only at North America but also at South America or China. A vision, therefore, far from the one imagined by the CEO of Ryanair, Michael O’Leary who in recent days had argued that the German group would do nothing for the growth of Ita, limiting itself to operating flights from Milan to Munich and Frankfurt.
The ongoing negotiations between the top management of Ita Airways and the unions on contractual, wage and work organization issues for ground and flight employees should not represent an obstacle to the operation. According to the same sources, in fact, the German airline would have taken into account the possibility of an increase in salaries in the event that the company and the unions dissolve the last knots.
Also because the salaries of the crew but also of the ground personnel are below market levels. The average salary of a commander with 15 years of seniority, 18 days of work in a month and 70 flight hours, as far as Ita Airways is concerned, is around 6,500 euros (95 euros per flight hour) and therefore, according to the unions, is very below the average of other companies. For the Irish low cost airline Ryanair it is around 11,520 euros (165 euros per hour of flight). For Easyjet it stands at 15,200 euros (217 euros per hour of flight), for Wizzair at 8,700 euros (124 per hour of flight) while for Vueling at 13,900 euros (199 per hour of flight).
