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Yesterday, Thomas Cook ceased operations and today, an airline stops its activities "temporarily".
Adria Airways temporarily ceases operations
Adria Airways is a Star Alliance airline based in Ljubljana, Slovenia. The airline has been in financial trouble for quite some time. It seems that the financial situation has become so bad that the airline has ceased operations.
Adria Airways announced the "temporary" suspension of its operations on 24 and 25 September 2019.. During these days, the airline will make a single return flight between Frankfurt and Ljubljana, Frankfurt being their main hub (because it feeds the Lufthansa network).
Adria Airways A319 Cabin
Today, the airline will offer a flight Frankfurt-Ljubljana and tomorrow a flight Ljubljana-Frankfurt.
Adria Airways advises passengers who have booked on Adria Airways to contact the company with which they have booked their tickets.
As the airline explains:
At this stage, the company is actively seeking solutions in cooperation with a potential investor. The goal of all those involved is to fly Adria Airways again according to schedule and that the stoppage of some operations is actually temporary.
The company deeply regrets the situation and apologizes to all its passengers and partners.
What's happening at Adria Airways?
Adria Airways has been losing money for years and the management team recently said it needed four million euros to stay in business for the time being. The government has refused to bail out the airline and it seems they have failed to find strategic investors.
The airline operated a fleet of about 20 aircraft, including A319s, CRJs and Saab 2000. However, many of these planes were taken over for lack of payments. For example, in recent days alone, three CRJ-900s have been taken over by the owners.
It is clear that Adria needs a radically different strategy and significant funding to survive. Four million euros could keep them alive a few more months, but that does not solve the underlying problem.
Adria Airways CRJ-900
Relationship between Adria and Lufthansa
Adria also has an interesting relationship with Lufthansa. Although they are not officially part of the Lufthansa Group (unlike the Austrian and Swiss groups), they are part of the Star Alliance network and use Miles & More as a loyalty program. Lufthansa uses Adria for most of its flights to Slovenia. Airlines have a close relationship.
This would also be a loss for Lufthansa, as Slovenia has long been a difficult market for them. It is not a high yield, but it has not been invaded by very low cost carriers yet. As a result, if Adria ceases operations, you can bet that very low cost carriers will gain a significant share of the market, which is not necessarily good for Lufthansa either.
Again, it's not as if the current configuration was working.
Lufthansa A320
Bottom line
On behalf of the more than 500 employees of Adria, I hope they can find funds and stay in business, even if I have doubts. The airline has been struggling for a long time and, unless a government bailout at the last minute or Lufthansa 's intervention, Slovenia will end up without a national airline.
From my flight experience with Adria earlier this year, I can not say that they've impressed me a lot …
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