Airline Choices for the Future: From Alliances to Mergers offers an up-to-date assessment of the industry as it stands today, delivering a comprehensive insight into how the world of airline alliances is changing, and how the merger phenomenon is likely to fit into the new scenario. The purpose of this book is twofold. Firstly, it outlines the evolution and the reasons behind alliances between international air carriers, the alliances' track records and the way they have affected airlines and the air transport industry. Secondly, drawing on past and more recent developments in the industry, it examines the experiences airlines involved in cross-border mergers have gone through and the advantages and difficulties they have come across. Alliances and mergers are presented from both the airline and the consumer perspective. The book provides a balanced account of where mergers and alliances have taken the industry to date, bridging the gap between merger theory and implemented practices and strategies. It also identifies the challenges alliances and cross-border mergers have faced and highlights the key forces affecting airline development. Theoretical evidence is supplemented by data collected via surveys and interviews with airline executives, aviation experts, consultants and regulatory bodies.

The airline industry generates operating revenues of $172 billion in 2007, amounting to over 1% of the U.S. gross domestic product. It carried more than 700 million passengers in 2007. Airline deregulation in 1978 led, at least in part, to increasingly volatile airline profitability, resulting in periods of significant losses and bankruptcies. In response, some airlines have proposed or are considering merging with or acquiring another airline. This report describes: (1) the financial condition of the U.S. passenger airline industry; (2) whether the industry is becoming more or less competitive; (3) why airlines seek to merge with or acquire other airlines; and (4) the role of fed. authorities in reviewing proposed airline mergers and acquisitions. Charts and tables.

The 2013 merger of American Airlines and US Airways marked a major step in the consolidation of the U.S. airline industry. A young management team that began plotting mergers a decade earlier designed a brilliant strategy to seize an industry prize. In doing so, it enlisted the help of unions who engineered one of the labor movement's biggest corporate victories. The airlines' histories and the inside story of the takeover is told by two veteran airline reporters.