Walsh: Branson ‘stuck in a timewarp’
03.10.08
British Airways chief executive Willie Walsh has accused Sir Richard Branson of being stuck in a 1996 time warp and claimed that his Virgin group has a problem counting to one, the Telegraph reports. In an escalating war of words between the two airline bosses, Mr Walsh urged the Virgin Atlantic founder to ‘wake up’ to new economic realities and stop relying on numbers that ‘don't add up’.
Writing in the latest edition of staff newspaper BA News, Mr Walsh said: ‘Almost all the arguments Virgin puts forward in relation to our application for a transatlantic tie-up with American Airlines rely on figures that are irrelevant or mistaken. Virgin even tries to deny that it has a monopoly on fast trains between London and Manchester. Yet any railway timetable shows that it does. Why should we trust any of Virgin's numbers if it has a problem counting to one?’
‘Richard Branson sounds like a broken record. He is stuck in the groove of 1996 when – in a completely different regulatory environment – we first applied for a link-up with AA. Three weeks ago he unveiled the slogan for his latest campaign against us [No Way BA / AA] – and guess what? It's exactly the same as the slogan he used in 1996.’
Mr Walsh claimed that Sir Richard's group can see no further than its predominantly point-to-point traffic between Heathrow and US cities. He said: ‘Virgin's business model is its own affair, but it seems to believe that the purpose of aviation regulation between the entire EU and the US is to give Virgin a cushy life. Wake up, Branson! The first stage 'Open Skies' agreement between the EU and US has changed everything.’
The BA boss stressed that the Star alliance – featuring Lufthansa and United, and Skyteam, including Air France/KLM and Delta – already has the anti-trust immunity BA and American are seeking. He also points out that, of the 42 airlines now flying between Europe and the US, only one is ‘voicing outright opposition’. He added: ‘For all Virgin's exaggerated talk of our venture with American creating a 'stranglehold' at Heathrow, the fact is that a deal would increase our existing slot-holding by just three percentage points [from 41% to 44%].’
We will report Sir Richard's response in the next couple of days. He is bound to release one.
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