Atlas to be sold? Hmmm...
 

Interesting news if accurate. Let’s hope it does not go through-

https://seekingalpha.com/news/386397...-worldwide-wsj
Atlas Air Worldwide (NASDAQ:AAWW) +13.9% in Monday's trading after The Wall Street Journal reported a group led by Apollo Global Management (NYSE:APO) is in advanced talks to buy the company.

A deal could come soon assuming talks do not fall apart, according to the report, which did not provide any potential deal specifics.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

Investment firms often use airlines to cross-subsidize failing investments (North American). I'd look at the state of their other assets to see what this means for our airline.

Apollo Global Management also owns Sun Country, since 2017. Or did. Interesting

Looks like they've also dabbled in aircraft leasing and have loaned money to Air France (for parts stock) and AeroMexico (for reorganization).

Aeromexico and Sun Country still exist, so at least there's that.

All we need (again) is Management that have no affinity with the product.

For now we don't know if they will change the management.

For what’s it’s worth some of their investments are extremely successful (Caesars, AMC). Sun Country has grown substantially during the period of Apollo’s investment. So maybe it’s a good thing? 🤞

They have their hands in 512 billion in assets, plenty of successful ventures, Harrahs (Caesar’s Palace) AMC theaters, a couple of cruise lines, Yahoo, ADT, etc. It will be interesting to see what impact they have if it goes through.

Curious as to how DHL feels about this?

Does it really matter? DHL has given away most of Atlas’s domestic flying and hasn’t grown our international network. So what does it matter how one of our investors feels about it if they refuse to grow us.

They will more than likely keep their shares and as long as the boxes keep moving more-or-less on-time DHL could care less who owns one of their subcontractors.

I think it could be a positive for you guys! Since Apollo took on Sun Country, they at least were willing to green light investment into attracting and maintaining talent as well saw with their CBA and have attempted to grow them.

Due to the fact that they own 49% of the polar certificate and the very lucrative asia trade routes associated with it?

This could be the best thing ever for Atlas crews or the worst. Too early to tell, but one can make an educated guess. Given Apollo owns Merx Aviation, a 208 aircraft dry leasing company, and Atlas tried in 2010 to sell off the aircraft minus the crews ( aka Project Panther ) does not bode well. Now it seems it’s been revealed why Atlas isn’t concerned about 500 plus pilots quitting annually. This deal has been in the works before the latest amalgamated contract. Which also explains why the amalgamation clause was eliminated; their biggest weapon against the pilot group. Management knew they would never need to worry about another CBA again.

Hopefully a Sun Country type outcome is in store, but given the 30 year track record of what management is capable of in regard to treatment of their crews, anything is possible. One thing is certain, our multitude of executive VP’s will be using their golden parachutes soon.

Ah….the other shoe just dropped.

Apollo has a 30 year track record of Sun Country type acquisitions, and no record of corporate raids, so I'm going to go with that.

But it's still way too early to tell. There are a lot of reasons why a deal like this can fall through.

Sun Country is still owned at least partially by Apollo, I believe. This move for Atlas may create some interesting developments in the "Amazon Air" space

While the contract at Sun Country is not directly related to Apollo Management itself, here are their rates vs Atlas on the 737

Year 1 SY FO 78 vs 5Y 92
Year 1 SY CA 196 vs 5Y 171

Year 3 SY FO 123 vs 5Y 122
Year 3 SY CA 215 vs 5Y 179

Year 7 SY FO 150 vs 5Y 134
Year 7 SY CA 228 vs 5Y 198

Sun country grew because
 

Their alpa pilot group almost struck over their contract Thad then won a grey contract thence the pilot group et al. Company grew. Strange treat your people well and the company grows.

Sunny guy here…
 

I am Fairly new at Sunny this year-

Jude bricker our CEO has been JONESIN for widebodies. In a recent article he wants to see one on property in the next five years, specifically Prime Air Financed then our own for PAX and charters…we got rumors over here that we might be apart of this deal with Atlas to get access now to widebodies because we don’t have the capability to launch a wide body today.

No idea if this makes any sense- but our new contract is pretty sweet and attrition has slowed considerably in the last few months. This month for FO and Cap we have almost every day 200 to 350 percent pick up open time trips. Big money this month for us.

Apollo has done a few buy-and-merge deals in the past so it would make sense. Of all the mergers rumors, I don't think anyone ever threw out Sun Country as a potential partner.
It would create a lot of synergies and it could be a good win-win for everyone.

So my crazy thinking on this: Apollo buys Atlas. Merges Sun Country and Atlas. Makes Sun Country management the management group for all. Then the SC management gets their wish of widebodies.

look at the pay rate table for sun country. The 737 tops out at 294 an hour, it’s the highest 737 rate under contract anywhere. The wide body rates are also pretty impressive. 350 an hour for the A330.
Apollo has slowly been cashing out. They own less than 51% of the company now.
it takes a good group of execs and management along with willing investors to make a successful airline. Sun country finally got that. The growth plan is impressive. Apollo was the best thing for the pilots at this airline. If it were ran like it was before Apollo came in Covid would’ve shut it down. It was run by very inept guys. Not airline savvy at all…

Also
 

To add to the possibilities*

Our union wants the company to provide positive space travel. We have a significant number of commuters here now and in line in training- many of our pilots who leave is simply because of commuting- getting access to your gateway positive space travel would be a huge win for our pilot group.

Also- technically* our new contract is an MOU…we are still finalizing our new contract from 2015…merging the best of both companies contracts for a unified contract may be a good time now…

Granted- I know nothing. But I always balked at us joining another tradition PAX ULCC. Jude wants to grow cargo and wants wide bodies…I think if there is a merger with sun country it would come from the ATI/ABX/Atlas business space. Amazon wants us to take on more but at the moment we are staff constrained.

IF there were a merger in the future, it will be interesting for sure. At this stage pure speculation.
Atlas is a good place to work- but not a carrier (retirement needs big time adjustments like 15% dc, ect)
I hear great things about Sun Country and their pilots seem pretty happy too. Plus they are ALPA

Things definitely could get very interesting next year to say the least. The sale has to go through first before anything happens to Atlas- good or bad.

In June we did get an email stating a demand for 737 instructors despite there being no additional 737s added. Maybe this is part of a potential merger.

Food for the rumor mill

That's mostly because a lot of instructors bid off the airplane once the SOC happened.

Sun Country was IPO'd a year and a half ago. Apollo no longer owns it or has a controlling position.

Yeah. I don’t really see a Atlas/Sun Country merger in the works. Also, it seems like Atlas isn’t really interested in growing a relationship with Amazon beyond what we already have. All that said, is the acquisition takes place, hopefully it can benefit the Atlas pilot group as much as it had for Sun Country.

Apollo is still the majority stock holder in Sun Country.

42%. Compared to indigo owning something like 80% of Frontier still.

https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/SNCY/holders/

Not majority, but likely controlling.

Just totally spitballing while this subject matter is fluid at best. Maybe Atlas just sells off the 73 side to Sun Country/Apollo/whoever for their growth with Amazon while we ever so slowly continue to pull away from them - Or maybe not for diversification. Bigger planes and proven bigger gains to be had in other markets rather than skimming for the Amazon troughs of minimal margins. Bring on more 777s, Airbus whatever or pax(Charter Only) birds as needed. Stay away from pax business, stick with charter if you must for the big money runs. Do what we do best for the cash cow, tailor made long haul cargo. Once again, just spitballing the other direction with focus on how we stand apart.

*Add an industry competitive retirement plan, creative schedules and comparable wages to match as the others leap frog each other and attrition would not be an issue. Just saying the obvious, it’s a no brainer.

Bring on 77 pax planes, get rid of the 76/73 fleet.
Grow AMC/VIP pax flying.
Buy Omni.

I find it doubtful that ATSG would sell Omni, particularly given the fact that they acquired it so recently.
My understanding is that we generate a lot of revenue from the 767 AMC flying, so I don't think we would see that fleet disappear. The 737s fate is anyone's guess.
But, what do I know.

Double the load, half the flights with a 77.

Many of the 767 flights’ pax load won’t even fill a 737. The Whale is doing very little AMC pax flying. AMC is inefficient, but not so much that they would want the 777 flying 60 pax to the ME.

This news may very well cause a run for the door by the people that were already on the fence.
I doubt DL or UA would announce a surprise take over.