According to information from German press agency, insolvent Air Berlin subsidiary Niki is to be sold to IAG holding, which includes, among ors, British Airways and Iberia. The IAG is last remaining bidder according to a message from Reuters. Accordingly, IAG offered a double-digit million amount and thus delivered highest offer. IAG rejected an opinion.
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The provisional Niki Insolvency administrator, Lucas Flör, shared that it would be negotiated exclusively with a bidder. That was decided by creditors ‘ Committee at a meeting. However, Flör did not call a name with reference to assured confidentiality. In next few days final sales contract should be available.
Flörs estimation, prospects are good that Niki will be sold in coming days and that as many as possible of approximately 1,000 jobs in Austria and Germany will be preserved. Even after insolvency of parent company Air Berlin, airline was regarded as a particularly attractive part of company.
Sale with start and landing rights
For insolvency administrator Flör is pushing time because operating licence has to be maintained in order to be able to sell airline with coveted launch and landing rights, so-called slots. Niki also threatens to go out of money. The buyer must refore be prepared to take over running costs even before transfer of company, Flör had said. Orwise a decommissioning is not to be avoided.
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Niki filed for bankruptcy in mid-December and ceased flight operations. Previously, planned takeover by Lufthansa for competition law reasons had failed. The EU feared that company would n be able to have a monopoly on some flight routes. The Federal Cartel Office has been observing Lufthansa since Air Berlin bankruptcy because prices for domestic connections have risen sharply.
Lufthansa had to pay a total of 210 million euros for Air Berlin daughters Niki and LG Walter, but with a good 190 million euro majority was earmarked for Austrian airline. Only takeover of LGW was approved.
At end of last week, six prospective buyers had made bids for Niki. Four bidders have been negotiating in past few days. In addition to IAG, travel group Thomas Cook (Condor) and TUIfly are also to belong to m. Niki-Founder and ex-racer Niki Lauda had declared on her own to be binding around airline with approximately 1,000 employees bid. He said he was out of race.
