Fresh interest in Deutsche BA

British Airways has received fresh interest in its German arm Deutsche BA just days after low cost carrier easyJet pulled out of plans to buy it, the airline said today.

Newspapers reported today that German holiday operator Tui, which owns Thomson Holidays, Lunn Poly and the airline Britannia, had rekindled an earlier interest in the carrier, which operates 130 flights a day and employs 800 people.

A spokeswoman for BA confirmed that there was fresh interest in the line but could not confirm the identity of interested parties.

She said: “We certainly have got other interested parties but any talks would be at an early stage. We are not prepared to speculate or name names.”

No one from Tui was immediately available to comment.

Luton-based easyJet secured an option with BA last May to acquire the airline, but on Tuesday blamed conditions in the German aviation market and a failure to agree employment terms with Deutsche BA staff for its decision not to proceed.

EasyJet wanted to align the German operation with its own low-cost model but ran into difficulties with pilots over a new pay structure.

The Luton-based low cost airline paid €600,000 a month for holding the option to buy Deutsche BA, which it said in May it would consider doing for a price in the region of €30m.

But chief executive Ray Webster said this week: “The rigidity of German labour laws has made it impossible to get acceptance of easyJet conditions of employment from key staff groups, despite numerous attempts and different approaches.

“Secondly, since we negotiated the option, there has been a substantial deterioration in the financial performance of all airlines in the German market, including DBA.”

BA also moved to deny speculation that it is planning a merger with Dutch carrier KLM.

British newspaper The Independent on Sunday said chief executive Rod Eddington would this week fly to Amsterdam for talks on a possible merger between the two airlines.

But the British Airways spokeswoman said there were no merger plans on the table.