Alitalia

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Alitalia - Società Aerea Italiana (Alitalia - Italian Air Company), operating as Alitalia (Italian: [ali'ta:lja]), is the flag carrier of Italy. The company has its head office in Fiumicino, Rome, Italy. Its main hub is Leonardo da Vinci-Fiumicino Airport, Rome, and a secondary is Linate Airport, Milan. Other focus airports are Catania-Fontanarossa Airport, Milan-Malpensa Airport, Palermo Airport and Naples Airport. In 2014, it was the eleventh-largest airline in Europe. The name "Alitalia" is an Italian portmanteau of the words ali (wings), and Italia (Italy).

On 2 May 2017, the airline went into administration after the Italian government formally approved the move.

Video Alitalia

History

Creation of Alitalia-CAI

In 2008, a group of investors formed the "Compagnia Aerea Italiana" (CAI) consortium to buy the bankrupt Alitalia - Linee Aeree Italiane ("old" Alitalia) and to merge these with Air One, another bankrupt Italian carrier.

On 30 October 2008, CAI offered EUR1 billion to acquire parts of the bankrupt airline, amidst pilots' and flight crew members' opposition to labour agreements. On 19 November 2008, CAI's offer was accepted by the bankruptcy administrator of Alitalia with the permission of the Italian government, at the time the majority shareholder of the bankrupt airline. Alitalia's profitable assets were transferred to CAI on 12 December 2008 after CAI paid EUR 1.05 billion, consisting of EUR427 million in cash and the assumption of responsibility for EUR625 million in Alitalia debt.

A USA diplomatic cable disclosed in 2011 summarised the operation as follows: "Under the guise of a rather quaint (and distinctly un-EU) desire to maintain the Italian-ness of the company, a group of wealthy Berlusconi cronies was enticed into taking over the healthy portions of Alitalia, leaving its debts to the Italian taxpayers. The rules of bankruptcy were changed in the middle of the game to meet the government's needs. Berlusconi pulled this one off, but his involvement probably cost the Italian taxpayers a lot of money."

On 13 January 2009, the "new" Alitalia launched operations. The owners of Compagnia Aerea Italiana sold 25% of the company's shares to Air France-KLM for EUR322 million. Air France-KLM also obtained an option, subject to certain conditions, to purchase additional shares after 2013.

The "new" Alitalia has not claimed the old Alitalia's history as its own, as can be seen in official documents regarding the new "Alitalia Group". Instead, they stressed that they were a totally different company: they chose not to recognize benefits such as discounted tickets to former Alitalia-LAI workers and refused to honour passengers' claims against the old Alitalia.

The new Alitalia does not own many of its operating airplanes. (Alitalia-LAI had owned all of its airplanes.) Almost every plane that CAI had acquired from the old Alitalia was sold or decommissioned. Alitalia-CAI airplanes are leased mostly from Aircraft Purchase Fleet (it), an Irish company owned by Carlo Toto, the former owner of the bankrupt Air One, which was merged in 2008 into Alitalia-CAI when the new company was founded.

History under new ownership

In January 2010, Alitalia celebrated its first anniversary since the relaunch. It carried 22 million passengers in its first year of operations. In 2011, 25 million passengers were carried. On 1 February 2010, it was announced that Alitalia crew would go on a four-hour strike over wages. This was the first strike action for Alitalia since the relaunch. On 11 February 2010, Alitalia announced that, starting from March 2010, it would use Air One as a low-fare airline ("Smart Carrier"), with operations based at Milan Malpensa Airport, focused on short-haul leisure routes. It was predicted that the subsidiary would handle 2.4 million passengers by 2012. In 2011, 1.4 million passengers were carried by the subsidiary. Although operations were initially to be concentrated at Milan Malpensa, Air One later operated from Milan-Malpensa, Venice-Marco Polo, Pisa and Catania as of January 2013.

On 12 February 2011, information was released about a possible merger between Alitalia and Meridiana Fly, another Italian carrier. The merger did not occur. On 23 February 2011, Alitalia and ENAC announced the introduction of a safety card written in braille and characters in 3-D relief, which is the first of its kind. On 25 January 2012, Alitalia signed memoranda of understanding with two other Italian airlines, Blue Panorama and Wind Jet, and said to have started processes "aimed at achieving integration" with them. By the end of July 2012, the Italian antitrust authority allowed Alitalia to acquire Wind Jet, but in return Alitalia would have to cede slots on domestic routes. Faced with this, Alitalia cancelled the plans a few days later in August 2012.

On 3 May 2013, in a sting codenamed "Operation Clean Holds", police made 49 arrests at Rome's Fiumicino airport, with another 37 in Italian airports including Bari, Bologna, Milan Linate, Naples, Palermo and Verona. All were Alitalia employees caught on camera and most were charged with aggravated theft and damage. In late 2013, facing bankruptcy, the loss of a major fuel supplier, and a possible grounding by Italy's civil aviation authority, the airline announced a EUR500 million rescue package which included a EUR75 million investment by the Italian state-owned postal operator.

In June 2014, the Abu Dhabi-based UAE national airline Etihad Airways announced it was taking a 49% stake in Alitalia. On 30 September 2014, Alitalia's budget subsidiary Air One ceased flight operations.

On 1 January 2015, Alitalia-CAI formally passed its operations to Alitalia-SAI, a new entity owned 49% by Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways and 51% owned by the former Italian stakeholders of Alitalia-CAI. In May 2015, Alitalia announced it would terminate its partnership with Air France-KLM in 2017, stating that there were no longer enough advantages from the joint venture to keep it up.

In February 2016, Alitalia announced that in late March 2016 it would cancel most of its routes from Pisa, including Moscow, Prague, Berlin, Catania and Tirana. Alitalia decided to continue flying to Olbia and Rome.

On 25 April 2017, after Alitalia employees rejected job-cuts proposal aimed at reducing costs, the airline announced that it will start going through a bankruptcy process, beginning with the appointment of an administrator. The Italian government permitted Alitalia to file for bankruptcy on 2 May 2017. On 17 May 2017, after the government had ruled out nationalizing the airline, it was officially put up for sale to be auctioned off. In June, low-cost carrier EasyJet expressed interest in purchasing the airline. Ryanair expressed interest in Alitalia but dropped its bid after the chaos caused by Ryanair's flights cancellations[1].

Maps Alitalia

Corporate affairs

Administration

Alitalia's head office is located in Building Alfa at Via Alberto Nassetti in Fiumicino, Province of Rome. The corporate headquarters was designed by AMDL, a Milan-based architecture firm. The head office was previously in a building at Piazza Almerico da Schio, also in Fiumicino.

The CEO of the airline from March 2016 to April 2017 was Cramer Ball, Chairman was Luca Cordero di Montezemolo, the vice chairman was James Hogan, ex president and CEO of Etihad Airways.

Advertising

A variety of different slogans have been used by Alitalia:

• "Alitalia vola con te" (Alitalia flies with you)
• "Fatti per volare alto" (Made to fly high)
• "Alitalia, al lavoro per te" (Alitalia, working for you)
• "Muoviamo chi muove l'Italia" (We move the people who keep Italy going)
• "Scegli come volare" (Choose how to fly)
• "The pleasure of flying Made in Italy"

In 2014, the company adopted a new slogan

• "Where the journey meets the destination." (International advertisement)

Finance and load factors

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• As of 29 July 2009, Alitalia is the first airline for domestic flights in Italy and, as of 4 October 2010, Alitalia is in second place for international flights to/from Italy.
• Alitalia was nominated as Europe's most punctual airline in 2010, and as one of the world's five most punctual airlines in 2011.
• As of 28 October 2010, Alitalia has 53% of the market share on domestic routes (based on seat capacity).
• Alitalia in 2017 has been the third most punctual Mainline (aeronautics) airline in Europe after airBaltic and Aer Lingus registering an overall 82.4% on-time performance record.

Major shareholding

Alitalia's shareholders have been CAI (Compagnia Aerea Italiana) 100%. CAI - Compagnia Aerea Italiana (Italian Air Partnership) is an Italian airline holding company whose main shareholders were: Intesa Sanpaolo (20.59%), Poste Italiane (19.48%) and UniCredit (12.99%).

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Destinations

Alitalia serves 97 destinations (as of April 2016). Alitalia's hub is at Rome's Leonardo da Vinci-Fiumicino Airport. Four other Italian airports are focus cities.

Codeshare agreements

Alitalia codeshares with the following airlines:

SkyTeam

Alitalia has been in the SkyTeam alliance since 2009; Alitalia-LAI originally joined in 2001. Alitalia has since arranged code-share agreements with SkyTeam members, allowing passengers to fly to numerous destinations (with some or all segments operated by airlines other than Alitalia) using a single Alitalia ticket. In July 2010, Alitalia also joined Air France, KLM and Delta's transatlantic Joint Venture, meaning that the profits from flights across the Atlantic are shared between the four airlines.

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Fleet

Current fleet

As of September 2017, the Alitalia mainline fleet (excluding subsidiary Alitalia CityLiner) consists of the following aircraft:

Fleet development

Between 2009 and 2011, Alitalia renewed its fleet with 34 new aircraft, while 26 older planes were retired. The renewal process ended in early 2013. These new planes are not owned by Alitalia itself, but are leased mostly from Aircraft Purchase Fleet, an Irish leasing company created by former Air One owner Carlo Toto primarily to purchase the new Alitalia fleet. Following the Air One merger, the entire fleet that was not already leased from other lessors, plus the former Air One fleet that was owned by Air One outright, came under the ownership of APF, a subsidiary of Toto's Italian conglomerate Toto Holding. The entire fleet, except the two new A330s, is now on the Irish registry instead of the Italian registry. With the new strategic plan focused on long haul, in January 2015 it was announced that seven wide-bodies would join the fleet beginning in May 2015 with an A330-200 in a new livery.

Historic fleet

• The Boeing 767-300ER was introduced to the Alitalia-Linee Aeree Italiane fleet in 1994, and retired after 17 years of service in 2012. The last 767 flight was AZ845 from Accra via Lagos to Rome on 25 October 2012.
• The McDonnell Douglas MD-82 was introduced to the Alitalia-Linee Aeree Italiane fleet in 1983, and then retired in 2012 after 29 years of service. The last flight with this aircraft type operated on 27 October 2012 using the plane with registration I-DATI on flight AZ1740 (Catania-Milan-Linate). The same aircraft on 17 December 2012 operated a memorial flight from Rome-Fiumicino Airport to Trieste Airport with journalists and ex-Alitalia's CEO Andrea Ragnetti on board. During landing, I-DATI was supported by Frecce Tricolori; they did a show for the occasion.

Special liveries

• In mid-2009, a Boeing 767-300ER (EI-DBP) was painted in the SkyTeam livery.
• On 19 July 2010, an Airbus A320-200 (EI-DSA), which had previously been in the Air One livery, was painted in a special "Alitalia.com" livery. This plane is now wearing Alitalia-SAI livery.
• In March 2012, an Embraer E-190-100LR (EI-RND) was delivered in the SkyTeam livery.
• In March 2012, a Boeing 777-200ER (EI-DDH) was painted in the SkyTeam livery.
• In April 2012, an Airbus A321-100 (EI-IXI) was painted in the historic livery of Freccia Alata-Linee Aeree Italiane, Alitalia's predecessor. This plane is now stored.
• In November 2013, an Airbus A330-200 (EI-DIR), which had previously been in the Air One livery, was painted in the SkyTeam livery.
• In March 2014 an Airbus A330-200 (EI-EJG) and an Airbus A320-200 (EI-DSM) were painted in a special livery dedicated to Calabria. EI-EJG is now wearing Alitalia-SAI livery and EI-DSM is sold to Congo Airways.
• In April 2014 an Airbus A319-100 (EI-IMI) was painted in a special livery dedicated to Friuli-Venezia Giulia. From August 2015 this plane is wearing Alitalia-SAI livery.
• In October 2014 an Airbus A330-200 (EI-EJM) was painted in a special livery, in cooperation with its partner Etihad Airways, dedicated to Expo 2015. This plane is now wearing Alitalia-SAI livery.

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Services

Cabin

Alitalia has four classes of service:

• Economy. On short and medium haul flights, passengers receive a free drink and a snack or light meal service, depending on the length of the flight. Personal TV screens for entertainment are present in each seat on some Airbus A320 and A319 planes. On long haul flights, passengers receive a free meal service as well as (on most planes) personal TV screens for entertainment.
• Premium Economy is available on some long haul flights. The service is the same as Economy, however passengers get some extra benefits such as extra leg room, dedicated check-in desks and a higher baggage allowance.
• Business Class Medium Haul has an improved catering service and baggage allowance compared to Economy, as well as a dedicated check-in desk and access to the V.I.P. lounges in the airport.
• Magnifica Class since the recent upgrade includes:
  • New catering (regionally focused, changes monthly and includes a new selection of wines and "spumante" prepared in cooperation with the Italian Sommelier Association)
  • New blankets, duvets, cushions, linens, amenity kits and china
  • New flat-bed Magnifica Class seats on Alitalia's Airbus A330-200 and 777 aircraft.

All Airbus A320 family aircraft were refitted with new "slim" leather Recaro seats in 2010. Seatback TV screens for entertainment were installed on some aircraft. Between December 2015 and April 2016, all Airbus A320 family aircraft will again receive new state-of-the-art black leather seats with beige headrest covers for Business Class and red ones for Economy Class as part of the airline's renewed corporate branding.

Alitalia has received in 2017 for the 8th consecutive year by the US publication Global Traveler USA the award "Best Airline Cuisine" for its Magnifica Class catering.

Frequent-flyer program

The airline's frequent-flyer program is named "MilleMiglia" (thousand miles), and is part of the SkyTeam alliance program, allowing passengers to collect miles and redeem them with free tickets across the whole alliance.

It also grants access to Alitalia's Privilege clubs, Ulisse, Freccia Alata, and Freccia Alata Plus, depending on the number of miles collected in a year, with various advantages depending on the club. These clubs give access to SkyTeam Elite (Ulisse) and SkyTeam Elite+ (Freccia Alata, Freccia Alata plus).

As of 3 February 2015 Etihad Airways has acquired a 75 per cent stake in Alitalia Loyalty S.p.A, the owner and operator of MilleMiglia, Alitalia's frequent flyer program, with Alitalia retaining the remaining 25 per cent stake. Alitalia Loyalty is now part of Global Loyalty Company (GLC), a loyalty and lifestyle company that allows Etihad Airways and its partners to target the global loyalty market more effectively, whilst driving technology and back office synergies. GLC also consists of Etihad Airways' Etihad Guest, airberlin's topbonus and Jet Airways' JetPrivilege programs. Together, Etihad Guest, topbonus, JetPrivilege and MilleMiglia have a combined total of 14 million members worldwide.

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Accidents and incidents

Listed here are incidents since Alitalia-CAI's launch of operations on 13 January 2009:

• On 24 April 2011, an attempt was made to hijack Alitalia Flight 329, en route from Charles de Gaulle Airport, Paris, France to Fiumicino Airport, Rome and divert it to Tripoli International Airport, Libya. The hijacker, reported to be an advisor to the Kazakhstan delegation to UNESCO, was subdued by cabin crew and other passengers. He was arrested and taken into custody after the aircraft made a safe landing at Rome.
• On 29 September 2013 at 20:10, an Alitalia Airbus A320 flying from Madrid-Barajas Airport to Leonardo da Vinci-Fiumicino Airport failed to lower the landing gear during a storm on landing and the aircraft toppled, skidded off the runway and crashed. 10 passengers suffered minor injuries and all 151 passengers and crew were evacuated and taken to hospital. The crash is still being investigated.

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See also

• Transport in Italy
• List of airports in Italy
• List of companies of Italy

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Notes

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References

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External links

Media related to Alitalia at Wikimedia Commons

• Official website (Mobile)
• Alitalia Corporate

Source of the article : Wikipedia