Translated material
AirUnion is not worth itself
The general director of Atlant-Soyuz airline Alexey Menitsky told reporters on Friday that Domodedovo Airlines (DAL), Samara and Krasair, members of AirUnion, will survive for a little more than three more weeks. “On September 30, by decision of Rosaviation, the operator certificates of these companies will be suspended,” he said.
The head of Rosaviation, Evgeny Bachurin, was a little less categorical, but on the whole confirmed Mr. Menitsky’s opinion that the companies that are members of AirUnion are not tenants. “For all alliance airlines there are conclusions that they do not comply with certification requirements. They can be stopped even today, but we will not do this,” Interfax quotes Mr. Bachurin. The head of Rosaviatsiya said that the final decision on this matter will appear this week.
AirUnion's route network will be transferred to Atlant-Soyuz this same week, Mr. Menitsky said. Already yesterday, all alliance flights were transferred from Domodedovo, from where they previously operated, to Vnukovo, the base airport of Atlant-Soyuz. Free buses will be launched between the two airports to transport confused and lost passengers. Mr. Menitsky said the idea was being considered to move all alliance flights by an hour or two so that people who arrived at the wrong airport by mistake would still be able to catch up with their plane.
The general director of Atlant-Soyuz noted that the fleet of companies in crisis will be transferred to his company only partially. “We need to look at the technical condition of the aircraft; we will probably not use the entire fleet. In the future, we will start planning a new park,” he said.
The new owners do not want to bankrupt AirUnion. This was announced on Friday by First Vice-Mayor of Moscow Yuri Roslyak, and Deputy Head of Russian Technologies Alexey Aleshin said that the state corporation has already allocated $100 million to AirUnion and has begun negotiations on restructuring the billion-dollar (in dollars) debt of the alliance.
“We are not yet rich enough to carry out recovery through the bankruptcy procedure... This is an inevitable drop in traffic, the loss of creditors,” said Mr. Roslyak. However, only the future will show whether Moscow and Russian Technologies are rich enough to pull an alliance with an essentially negative asset value out of the debt hole. Last year, in preparation for the merger of the three above-mentioned companies - members of AirUnion, as well as two completely private ones (Sibaviatrans and Omskavia), Rosimushchestvo estimated their total value at 7.52 billion rubles, including 4.36 billion rubles . state assets. This is significantly less than the alliance’s current debt (approximately 25 billion rubles). In addition, it must be taken into account that Sibaviatrans and Omskavia continue to remain with their previous owners. The value of these companies, although relatively modest, has yet to be subtracted from the assets transferred to the new "big airline" on behalf of the government.
In general, the assessment of the assets of this “big” company, which does not even have a name yet, promises to be a difficult and potentially conflicting task. Mr. Roslyak stressed on Friday that the capital’s government is counting on a “significant” stake in this new company, allowing it to participate in its management. Meanwhile, Atlant-Soyuz is significantly inferior in market weight to other companies transferred to the new association. Although it is still possible to estimate the ratio of these specific gravity only very approximately. The largest of the companies mentioned in the government plan, State Transport Company Rossiya, occupies third place in the ranking of domestic airlines in terms of the number of passengers transported. Atlant-Soyuz follows closely behind in ninth place. Rossiya has a fleet of 70 mainline airliners, AirUnion has a fleet of about 110 (although the age and technical condition of these aircraft are very different, which predetermines Mr. Menitsky’s cautious attitude towards them). Atlant-Soyuz boasts only 15 passenger aircraft.
As is known, the government plan involves the transfer of a controlling stake in the new company to Russian Technologies. But taking into account all the state-owned companies transferred to the new association, the share of Russian Technologies in its capital promises to be simply overwhelming, which hardly meets the expectations of the Moscow government.