Gerald Butt/NICOSIA
Cyprus Airways is putting together a consortium to bid for a stake of up to 30% in Olympic Airways. The Greek Government has said it wants to sell 65% of the debt-ridden national carrier.
The Cyprus Airways consortium, comprising Cypriot, Greek and other investors, is to present a business plan to the Athens government ahead of a 31 January deadline. Shortlisted bidders will then have until the end of March to come up with a detailed proposal.
For some years, Cyprus Airways has been looking to expand its presence in Greece and at one time thought of basing its charter operator Eurocypria in Athens to cash in on the lucrative tourist traffic there from northern Europe. "Now a better opportunity has come up," says Cyprus Airways. "We think we are well placed to take over part of Olympic Airways because we have experience of the Greek market going back some 50 years, and around 25% of our operations are there."
The names of other potential investors in Olympic have not been made public - but it is understood that no major European airlines are among them.
Cyprus will not reveal details of its business plan for Olympic, but says that there would have to be "major transformations, in management and elsewhere", adding: "We don't think anyone can run the airline in the state it's in now."
Cyprus Airways is meanwhile in the final stages of evaluating offers from Airbus and Boeing for the supply of aircraft for its long-term fleet replacement programme. A final decision is due late this month.
The Greek government has been seeking to offload a share of Olympic for some time. The sale attempt with British Airways collapsed early last year.
Source: Flight International
