South Florida Sun-Sentinel Palm Beach (Sunday)
JetBlue CEO says Spirit merger will grow flights
Airline would be major player in Orlando, Fort Lauderdale
With a successful acquisition of Spirit, JetBlue would become the largest airline in Orlando and in Fort Lauderdale by far.
JetBlue’s chief executive officer, Robin Hayes, said Friday that combining the two airlines will give travelers a more credible alternative to American, Delta, Southwest and United.
“We have four powerful airlines and the best way we believe to create a more competitive industry is to have a bigger JetBlue,” Hayes said of his company’s pitch to regulators for approving a merger.
“These are two, relatively small airlines coming together to form a medium size airline that will still be less than half the size of the big four airlines,” Hayes said.
Proceedings for the $3.8 billion merger are now in the hands of the U.S. Department of Justice.
Some in the travel industry have raised concerns that allowing the acquisition to create the nation’s fifth largest airline would reduce competition and push fares higher in two of Florida’s key destination markets.
The current combination of JetBlue and Spirit in Orlando and Fort Lauderdale is far from small or medium.
According to the Greater Orlando Aviation Authority, which runs Orlando’s airport, Spirit, the second busiest airline, is scheduling in February an average of 92 daily departures and JetBlue, the fifth busiest, is scheduling 53 daily departures.
The combination of JetBlue and Spirit flights at 145 would dwarf the 108 daily departures this month by Southwest, long Orlando’s busiest airline, and would eclipse the total of 144 departures by Delta, American and United.
Last month at Fort Lauderdale’s airport, Spirit led in passenger volume with 327,884 travelers on departing flights and JetBlue was second busiest with 229,144.
Their combined volumes of more than 557,000 departing passengers for January outperformed the next three busiest airlines, Southwest, Delta and United, which combined put more than 392,000 travelers on departing lights for the month.
Orlando’s airport authority, when asked if a merger would hurt or help competition and fares, responded that the airport is large, has an extensive lineup of domestic and international carriers and is ready to grow significantly.
“The combined airline, if approved, will enable it to grow even more at MCO, offering passengers more choice, while still having to remain competitive against more than 30 other airlines,” said Kevin Thibault, the authority’s executive director.
Fort Lauderdale’s airport did not respond to a request for comment about the merger’s potential impact on competition and fares.
Asked if an acquisition would mean cutting back flights or hiking fares in either Orlando or Fort Lauderdale, Hayes said the opposite would result.
“We are not doing this to shrink, we are doing this to grow,” Hayes said.
He said JetBlue would retain its customer amenities, including free Wi-Fi and seat-back television.
When asked if JetBlue would continue pricing of Spirit, offering cheaper base fares but with an array of fees, Hayes said his carrier would continue its low fares, though he often referred to a broader outlook than just the Florida airports.
“By combining with Spirit, we can now maybe double the size of JetBlue, bring more JetBlue flights to more high fare markets, discipline the legacy carriers, force them to bring fares down,” he said.
“I recognize that it’s going to make us a bigger player in both Fort Lauderdale and Orlando,” Hayes said, estimating the merged airline would operate a quarter of flights at Orlando International.
He said JetBlue has offered to give up five gates in Fort Lauderdale to allow a greater presence by other airlines.
After that, Hayes said, the merged airline would operate about 35 percent of flights.
“Of course, in Fort Lauderdale the benefit is people won’t have to drive to Miami as they do today for certain destinations because they are not served out of Fort Lauderdale,” Hayes said. “We are going to serve a much greater range of destinations, with markets like London potentially.”
Beyond what a merger means for travelers, JetBlue and Spirit have major support operations in Orlando and Fort Lauderdale.
JetBlue runs a training center and hangar at Orlando International, while Spirit runs a flight operations center in Orlando and is building a headquarters building in Dania Beach just south of the Fort Lauderdale airport.
“For the corporate center they are building, absolutely keeping it and we’ve said anyone working for Spirit now and wanting to stay in Fort Lauderdale can do that,” Hayes said. “JetBlue doesn’t actually have a headquarters, we have what we call support centers.”
Hayes said a successful merger, which also will need approvals by the U.S. Department of Transportation and the Federal Aviation Administration, could by early to mid 2025 begin to gradually bring the JetBlue brand to Spirit planes, crews and other assets.
“The bottom line is the whole process is a multiyear process,” he said.