AF/ KL In Serious Financial Trouble
da airliners.net
The January print edition of
http://www.capital.fr exposes AF's financial dire straits.
It has accumalated debts since March 2009 of over €6.5BN compared with LH's €1.6BN.
AF pilots fly an average of 620HRS P/A versus LH 700HRS P/A and both earn an average of €110K.
EZ pilots fly 800HRS and earn €100K.
AF pilots cost 34% more.
In 2011,AF shareprice has dropped by 70%!.
On European routes,it loses €600M P/A!
The restruction plan by the new CEO,Juniac will be met by strong resistance from powerful unions and if François Hollande wins in May,there will be none.
Last year,LH surpassed AF/KLM in terms of PAX.
The other issue is safety and
http://www.planecrash.info gives AF a massive thumbs down.
IMO,AF must go really upmarket for longhaul and totally downmarket for shorthaul in order to be economically viable.
The other problem is image:AF does not get anybody's rocks off!
CEO Juniac admires SQ and rumour has that it will join SkyTeam this year.