Andrew Doyle/MUNICH
Austrian Airlines has publicly accused Lauda Air's executive board of financial mismanagement and flouting company law over its controversial plan to rescue the carrier by selling and leasing back its aircraft fleet.
Austrian, which owns 35.9% of struggling Lauda, is meanwhile seething over the failure of Lauda's management team to hand over an audit report compiled by accountants Deloitte & Touche. The report is understood to predict that Lauda will close the financial year to the end of October with a loss of Sch1 billion ($62.5 million) - far higher than chief executive Niki Lauda's forecast of Sch558 million.
Lauda plans to raise Sch1.1 billion to offset the loss through a complex aircraft sale and leaseback transaction, which Austrian says "violates company law requirements without the required permission of the [shareholder] supervisory board".
The flag-carrier opposes Lauda's plan as "a mere financial transaction which will heavily burden future costs". It adds: "The question arises whether the Lauda Air managing board, which obviously violates all of the rules of proper management, is really able to reorganise the company."
Austrian says Lauda's failure to reveal the contents of the audit report is preventing an "objective analysis" of the company's problems. "The longer that this is put off, the more precarious could the financial situation of Lauda Air become," it says.
Austrian Airlines managing board member Dr Herbert Bammer says given that Lauda Air management "clearly recognizes the threat of insolvency, it is extremely irresponsible to want to make a quick decision about a transaction valued in the billions as a pure accounting measure".
The Lauda Air supervisory board, which includes representatives of the company's shareholders, was meeting in Vienna as Flight International closed for press.
Source: Flight International