Each new U.S. gateway that Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar Airways add reduces the viability of 1) U.S.-operated transatlantic flights; 2) the services U.S. airlines' joint venture partners operate beyond European hubs (like Frankfurt for Lufthansa, allied with United) to points in Africa, the Middle East, and all of Asia; and 3) crucially, the whole U.S. domestic network.
This year, the fund took a 33.3 percent stake in Japan's first low-cost international airline, a joint venture between All Nippon Airways and a fund based in Hong Kong.
Willie Walsh, the IAG chief executive, said: " The creation of IAG has resulted in greater buying power for both airlines through joint procurement and we have been able to obtain delivery slots for Iberia as part of British Airways' order".
A consultant is to be appointed soon to advise the airlines, and joint committees will look at areas of potential co-operation such as schedules and engineering.Sceptics believe that an immediate full merger is unworkable because the airlines' combined workforce of 33,500 will continue to cling defiantly to historically different traditions, pay scales, promotion arrangements, and other benefits.
The nation's top five airlines, including joint figures for United-Continental and Southwest-AirTran, accounted for 85 percent of all domestic seats in 2010; that compared with a 64 percent share for the top five in 2000, said Hunter Keay, an aviation analyst at Wolfe Trahan & Company.
It also recommended that airlines replace joints after 50,000 cycles for the more than 2,000 737s it had already produced.
British Airways and Iberia, Spain's flag-carrying airline, formed a joint venture in 2011.
The Senate Commerce Committee also plans to hold a hearing this month on the airline industry's joint Web sites.
If Aer Lingus and Ryanair were to merge, the joint airline would account for 83 percent of flights in and out of Ireland, Mr. Koulouris said.
British Airways' brief flirtation with Qantas ended when they proved unable to agree terms for a merger – the Australian carrier wanted 55 per cent of the operation, rather than half, and is said to have insisted that the joint airline's HQ be in Sydney rather than London, the centre of world aviation.
