The Waco Kid

Can anyone in the 'know' speculate on the international growth plans at American? Seems to me that AA, while having a stronghold on South America, doesn't compare to UAL and DAL in terms of Europe, Asia and 'rest of world' (i.e. India, Africa, Australia, Middle East ect...) service/destinations.

Thanks,

Kid

Laker24

Doug Parker isn't very interested in organic growth. He likes to make deals, find synergies, cut costs, profit through paying less in wages, etc. I hope I'm wrong but I bet he will spend 99% of his energy on reducing costs and maximizing current revenue streams.


International growth is expensive. I believe he recently said that AA will never be a UAL or DAL in the Asia arena.

AA will pay parity in 2016 but the next contract will be a big battle. The recent news from American Eagle is a good insight into DP's thought process and negotiating style. He's friendly as h#ll when he needs something from you but once you loose your leverage he will nail you to the ground and say "sorry it's just business."

meyers9163

Hmmm I agree on Asia but AA has a good presence in Europe..... All talk I've heard is Asia.... Kirby has always wanted to but Airways alone never had an aircraft capable. Now as AA we do with the 777..... Also see that we are starting new Asian routes out of DFW soon.

R57 relay

The problem with Asia is that DL and UA inherited systems that came from long ago treaties. It would be hard, if not impossible to match their systems with the current situation.

There are a lot of possibilities and AA will probably take the moves there when it can. At one time Europe was about as difficult.

lolwut

Lots of widebodies on the way.

3x A330
22x A350
10x B777
42x B787

Thats 77 widebodies on order.

Even if you park all 68 B767s (not counting the AA 762s as they're being replaced by A321s), you still have a 13% net gain in frames and huge net gain in capability... 773s and 359s are really substantial airplanes to be replacing 767s with.

This fleet is going to have to be used somewhere. Wonder where.

Are any of AA's oldest B777-200s or US's oldest A330-300s due for retirement within the next 5-10 years?

Sliceback

"In the know"? The folks that REALLY know won't put it on the internet.

Deliveries by end of 2016 -

3x A330
10x 777-300
42 787 currently 15 -8 and 27 -9's

Gain of 55 in three years.

767-300 retirements under 'Stand Alone' plan would have been approx. 28-34 leaving a net gain of 25 +/-.

'Stand Alone' bosses gone. No clue what new model is. My guess is synergies push back 767-300 retirements or perhaps additional w/b orders and continue 767-300 retirement plan.

Range capability of new a/c along with size/range of the 787-8, will open up new market potential. It will be interesing.

aa73

There is a lot of growth to be done at AA, IMHO.

R57 relay

I think this provides a good insight to Parker. From the Seeking Alpha 3rd quarter 2012 analyst conference call transcript. A question about about F/As rejecting their contract:





And we will take our next question from Jamie Baker.
Jamie N. Baker - JP Morgan Chase & Co, Research DivisionDoug, question on labor. How should we be thinking about timing for a possible third vote at the AFA? And what sort of sweeteners do you think you need to offer, just given how close the vote was last time? And second, where do you stand with USAPA right now? I know about, I think, 1 week ago, there was a ruling from Judge Silver as it relates to the seniority issue. How does that impact the negotiation trajectory from here?
William Douglas Parker - Executive Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, Chairman of Labor Committee, Chairman of Us Airways and Chairman of AwaYes, Jamie. Well anyway just to review for everyone's benefit, what Jamie is referring to is our flight attendants narrowly rejected a contract that was recommended by their negotiating team and by their leadership. It was 51, 49 against the -- so anyway, the problem is that, that was also endorsed by the National Mediation Board and what we had all been told. And what the advisers [ph] have been told is if indeed this didn't pass this time, we'd have a period of recess to let everyone think about what comes next. So I think that's where we are now, but we'll see. We're waiting for -- our flight attendants will probably lead in the National Mediation Board. We, you certainly should not be expecting any sweeteners from the company. That's the way this works. No votes don't result in sweetened contracts. They result in some time for people to contemplate and come back and see if they want to vote on the contract again or else have some time off to think about it some more. So that's where we stand right now, but you shouldn't be contemplating, putting any higher expenses into your models than what was out there before."

There ya go-no votes don't get you more. Parker and his team are masters of the RLA. They knew there was no way the NMB would allow a strike and they pretty much put a gun to the F/As head. Vote for this contract or we will leave you out in the cold with the AA merger.

That said, I still think they are the right team to lead the merger. People just need to understand how they work. They will hold base meeting smile, listen to you vent, but the real reason for them is to get their message out.

I think Parker has some real strengths. He learns from his mistakes(and he's made some doozies) and he puts the right people in place. This place was an operational mess after the US/AW merger. Kirby was trying to be the numbers guy and ops guy and it didn't work. The brought in Isom who has done a great job.

I think we have a great opportunity here, but we need to get our act together to deal with these guys.

D B Cooper

Didn't AA retain a lot of the slots from TWA as far as Europe was concerned. It was my understanding that was one of the reason they bought us.

R57 relay

I can't remember. Seems like TW had a lot of LHR slots, but I thought AA bought them before the TW merger. Didn't they also have a CDG hub?

Seems like I remember US Air purchasing some route authority from TWA, then giving it up to BA when they bought part of us.

It's been a long time.