HOPES have been raised that the Aberdeen-based regional arm of airline BMI may be sold to a consortium of local businessmen, securing nearly 400 jobs, after its new owner said it was not part of the company's long-term plans.
International Airlines Group, the parent company of British Airways, yesterday finalised its £172.5 million purchase of BMI from Lufthansa and confirmed plans to integrate the heavily loss-making airline into BA's operations.
But it said that BMI Regional and low-cost airline bmibaby "are not part of IAG's long-term plans". It added in a statement: "IAG will pursue options to exit these businesses and more details will be provided in due course."
Lufthansa had tried to dispose of both bmibaby and BMI Regional prior to the sale but failed to secure a buyer, prompting union concerns yesterday for the future of around 800 staff at both airlines.
However, a group of investors known as Granite is understood to be close to finalising a deal to buy BMI Regional, which flies from Glasgow, Aberdeen and Edinburgh to a number of UK and European airports.
The consortium nearly reached a deal late last year which fell through after one of the backers pulled out, a source said. "They're about 95% there. There have been hopes raised in the past but there is a new investor in place," the source added.
The consortium is being led by Ian Woodley and Graeme Ross, who founded Business Air before it was sold to British Midland in 1996 and changed its name to BMI Regional. Another key player is Robert Sturman, who was chief executive of British World Airlines for a decade.
Last week, IAG warned that the takeover of BMI was likely to lead to up to 1200 job losses.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article