IAG eyes empty slots left by Monarch
Chief executive Willie Walsh said on Friday that IAG had been eyeing off slots left empty at Gatwick Airport as a result of Monarch's collapse earlier on 2 October, which came shortly after Alitalia and Air Berlin had also entered administration, reducing capacity in the highly competitive European airline sector.
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Speaking at the CAPA Centre for Aviation's global summit, Walsh said, "With Monarch, I think everybody's interested in slots at Gatwick, and that would be principally our interest as well. If we can get more slots at Gatwick, we'll certainly be looking for more."
The comments by the head of IAG, British Airways' parent company, came less than 24 hours after Norwegian Air's chief executive, Bjorn Kjos, confirmed that the Scandinavian carrier had also expressed interest in the slots, but noted that "it depends on the price."
"What the whole combination does is it clearly means there will be less growth, less capacity going into the market, particularly through this winter, so from an industry point of view that's probably to be viewed as a positive," Walsh added.
He said that while Monarch's flights out of Gatwick would most likely be replaced, its slots at quieter airports like Birmingham could remain vacant for now as increased demand for low-cost services made it more difficult for British Airways to generate profits, IAG's focussed on its new long-haul, low-cost airline Level.
Level had a planned fleet of as many as 30 aircraft by 2022 and was looking into launching services to Asia in an effort to compete with Norwegian's direct flights from Gatwick to Singapore.
As of 1610 BST, IAG shares were down 0.64% to 622.50p.