Marc Bennetts

A TAKEOVER of Aer Lingus makes more sense than the airline joining an alliance.

AER Lingus can survive as a standalone airline but it might prefer to sell a stake to a larger player to take part in the sector’s consolidation wave, its chief executive has said.

RYANAIR has hit back at claims from Aer Lingus that its stake in the airline is a poison pill.

Brussels: American Airlines and fellow Oneworld alliance partners British Airways and Iberia face fresh EU antitrust hurdles as they look to extend their pact to include co-ordinated schedules and prices.

A merger of Qantas and British Airways must involve control of the “Flying Kangaroo” remaining in Australia, officials in the country insisted today, as Qantas shares surged on hopes a deal would see it emerge a stronger competitor to big regional rivals like Singapore Airlines.

THE Irishmen at the head of two of the world’s largest airlines are reported to be in merger talks.

Air France-KLM and US airline Delta today unveiled plans for transatlantic flights out of Heathrow in a move set to rival British Airways.

AER LINGUS could lose up to €50 million a year in revenues from its decision to pull out of the Oneworld airline alliance.

British Airways, Europe's biggest airline, has reported a rise in passenger traffic for December.

British Airways has signed a deal with Swiss International Air Lines to make the Swiss carrier part of the Oneworld global airline alliance.

Denmark's daily paper Berlingske Tidende has quoted Torben Anker Soerensen, MD of Scandinavian budget airline Sterling European, as saying that it is in talks with several rivals on creating an alliance of low-cost carriers.

The European Commission said it is likely to look favourably on a deal between British Airways PLC and Swiss International Airlines that will see the struggling Swiss carrier join the OneWorld global airline alliance.

British Airways has announced a deal with Swiss International Airlines that will see the two companies sharing flights between their two countries.

British Airways confirmed today that it had left the way open for a potential link with Dutch airline KLM, but ruled out a full-blown merger.

SAN FRANCISCO’S Oracle raced to victory over OneWorld of Seattle yesterday for the right to take on Switzerland’s Alinghi for a place in the America’s Cup next year.

ITALY bade arrivederci to an increasingly bitter America’s Cup in Auckland yesterday as holders Team New Zealand (TNZ) accused its challengers of cheating by copying a revolutionary boat design.

SWITZERLAND’S Alinghi yesterday qualified for the finals of the challenge round of yachting’s America’s Cup by defeating American rival Oracle on the Hauraki Gulf.

YACHTING’S America’s Cup was last night sailing into a new storm as holders Team New Zealand (TNZ) questioned the legal standing of a crucial tactic of the likely challenger.

HEAVY winds and high seas have forced the postponement of racing in the America’s Cup challengers semi-finals, with Swiss syndicate Alinghi just one win away from reaching the final.

THE BOATS, if these computer-sculpted splinters can be called watercraft at all, are utterly charmless.

EMBATTLED America’s Cup challengers OneWorld led from start to finish to open a 2-0 lead yesterday over bitter US rival Team Dennis Conner in their quarter-finals repechage.

AN AMERICA’S CUP jury will meet today to hear a New York Yacht Club request that Seattle’s OneWorld Challenge be expelled from the premier sailing event for breaches of sportsmanship and fair play.

DENNIS CONNER’S America’s Cup team said yesterday they would use a boat which sank to the ocean floor only four months ago for their sudden death challengers quarter-final against Britain’s GBR Challenge.

Hong Kong and the US broke a three-year deadlock by agreeing terms on a new air services pact, effectively giving Hong Kong flagcarrier Cathay Pacific the right to serve virtually all major US destinations and American carriers greater access to Asia's lucrative skies.

THE British crew in the Louis Vuitton Cup, the challenger series for the America’s Cup, took a step up into what has been described as the ‘middle league’ the four teams likely to tussle over the valuable fourth semi finals spot when they dispatched Sweden’s Victory Challenge yesterday by a comfortable 48 seconds.

BRITAIN were defeated in their historic first return to the America’s Cup stage in 15 years, as they lost to Team Dennis Conner’s vastly experienced crew on Stars and Stripes in the first showcase race of the 31st America’s Cup series.

THEY MAY have been jousting there for the last two months, jostling, sandbagging and sprinting to see whose latest boat has the edge, and whose despite the millions invested in research and development may yet be ‘off the pace’, but the real 2002/3 America’s Cup story starts to unfold in earnest next Tuesday.