The sale of FlyBe’s operating assets to Connect Airways was completed late last night.
Today’s confirmation of the sale of Flybe to Connect Airways secures an exciting future for our customers & employees as we continue to provide vital regional connectivity in the UK & beyond. Our confirmed schedule operates as normal & you can book now at https://t.co/YMvEJVdbsP pic.twitter.com/oRGqkNpVQp
— Flybe ✈ (@flybe) February 21, 2019
The sale is worth £2.8million (up from the original £2.2million offer).
Shareholders stand to yield one penny per share held.
And with that – FlyBe continues to fly for now, with operations continuing as planned for the Spring/Summer 2019 timetable.
The remaining shell company – FlyBe Group has no assets of its own now and is subject to be sold.
Connect Airways is a consortium made up of Virgin Atlantic (who hold 30%) Cyprus Capital Partners (who hold 40%) and Stobart Aviation (who hold 30%).
There was a late bid by a group led by Mesa Airlines, hedge fund Bateleur Capital, along with Andrew Tinkler (formally of Stobart Group) was rejected by FlyBe as it perused the sale to Connect Airways.
Now comes that hard work
Buying a failing airline can be seen as the easy part. Turning it around and making it profitable again (especially in the current trading environment) will be the challenge for Connect Airways.
And you can bet reasonable money that the FlyBe network will be examined for inefficient and weakly performing routes – and where restructuring is needed.
But for those who work for FlyBe, there is security, for now, the airline will continue to survive.
The trick will be to make it thrive.
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