On the contract piece - I'm guessing there's a transfer clause stating that a buyer would be responsible for honoring the remainder of the contract at the rates Mesa agreed upon. Given Mesa's current fiscal position, I can't imagine that contract is a big money maker and it would more financially advantageous to just let Mesa go under than to buy them.

But then again, United owns a 19% stake in Republic, so if Republic wants to keep getting UAL contracts, it may behoove Republic to take this on...

Yea, no reason for Republic to drop a dime or put any effort to doing anything with Mesa. Now that United owns the 175's, all United needs to do if they want is to reassign those tails to either Republic, SkyWest, or even possibly Commutair. Honestly, if I were a betting man, I would put more stake in Commutair ending up with these 175's before Republic getting involved with Mesa.

Thats the logical answer. UA owns 40% of C5. Financially it is in their interest to move the 175 to them and take advantage of all that comes with it.

I would be very shocked if Republic outright buys Mesa and assumes their debt. Only way anything like that would happen is through some sort of debt negotiation thru United. Republic has plans (ambitions) for some Manifest Destiny out west and will need planes/crews, but taking on unnecessary debt seems unwise.

Suposedly the old Lynx certificate might be getting some of that dust knocked off as Republic moves forward with something called "Brickyard Connection". Not sure what it's gonna be just yet, but my guess (based on zero concrete knowledge) is competition for Sky West Charters.

Interesting. Skypest and Republic are really the last 'independent' multiple business line contract carriers. I can see Republic looking for additional diversification (they had that with Frontier and Midwest though and gave it up).

With the current focus on government 'waste' I wouldn't be focusing on EAS contracts (plus ZW just went all-in on that front). As currently structured it really stretches the definition of essential and the risk of someone in the administration pushing to reduce spending pointing that out is way less than 0.

I agree C5 seems more logical than Republic but United 'invests' in all of their regional 'partners' so that isn't the only reason. I think their stake in Mesa is almost as big as the one in C5, the key difference being C5 gives them more control than JO does and IIRC C5 is not public.