Malaysia Airlines-AirAsia merger ‘would not help customers’
The prospect of a Malaysia Airlines-AirAsia merger has been ruled out by MAS CEO Christoph Mueller, who said it would not benefit customers.
“I am a strict opponent to this, I would absolutely advocate for each country to have two carriers,” he said, adding that healthy competition on routes will keep air fares down.
“If prices from Kuala Lumpur to Kota Kinabalu or Kuching are subjected to a monopoly situation, it is not good for both the economy and country,” he said.
AirAsia group CEO Tony Fernandes recently revealed the two airlines were in discussions to potentially operate joint maintenance facilities.
This led to talk of possible cooperation across all flight operations, or even a merger.
Several years ago MAS and AirAsia entered into a tentative agreement to form an alliance and not compete on the same routes but this was aborted following a public outcry.
However, AirAsia said it could take over some of the domestic routes MAS is scrapping as long as they were financially viable.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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