Oh Alitalia, why can’t you have any really exciting news? Instead, we just get to watch Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi 
try to pull his foot out of his mouth and find a way to do exactly what he said he wouldn’t; get an foreign carrier to fix Alitalia. Good luck with that.
Remember how Silvio wanted to keep Alitalia Italian? And how that killed the airline’s best prospect for survival, a takeover by Air France/KLM? Yeah, well I had to laugh when I saw the International Herald Tribune headline, “Italy gov’t in Alitalia talks with foreign company.”
I think it’s time to get a little cranky here. What the hell is wrong with the Italian government? They had a perfectly good solution that is now gone, and they’ve let millions of euros just drain away as they sit with their thumbs up their asses. It’s time for some action instead of just bombastic talks. Oh sure, Berlusconi’s words make it sound like things are moving along.
We already have an industrial plan, the partners and the necessary capital, and we are negotiating with a big foreign company for an alliance at the international level.
Sounds good, right? But I think the IHT says it best.
However, the government has failed to present its plan by an end-of-July deadline, and no significant development is expected to be announced during the summer.
I’m sure the government is all too busy going on holiday during the month of August to bother with something like this. Just imagine how much money disappears into this black hole daily? Will someone just get this over with? Pull the bandage off quickly instead of slowly peeling it off.
5 comments on “Alitalia Keeps on Truckin’”
Why are you always hatin on Alitalia? We all know they suck. After awhile, dude, it’s like clubbing a baby seal. Move on…
I know, I know, but you’d be surprised how many people like the updates. I get emails every single time I post about them!
Austrian may sell to Lufthansa, Iberia may merge with BA, KLM is practically French, so I wonder why Alitalia was so bent on staying Italian. Must be a neofascist thing.
Here’s a thought: Merge Alitalia with Olympic and create Panhellenic Airlines! Turn the entire operation in to a low-cost product similar to Ryan Air and Southwest except for the intercontinental service. Create a huge hubbing zone to compete with the Middle East carriers for short hops across the Med and into Northen Africa and the gulf region. Better yet, add the resources of Turkish Air and Middle East Airlines in to the mix for one seriously huge Roman Empire of an airline!
Together the ancients will rule the Mediterranean once again. Considering well over 100 million people live along the fringes of the Mediterranean, with some reworking of trade zones and border patrols, that’s a home base even the big Europeans would drool over!
Airbus fleet commonalities already exist, the big 777s of Alitalia to carry the Jo’Burg, Tokyo and Hong Kong traffic and a huge fleet of narrow-bodies perfectly primed for all those British package holiday destinations on virtually every rock with a runway in that corner of the world. It’s perfect!
I always enjoy the updates on Alitalia, it’s basically my favorite Airline Soap Opera.