Mexicana

Airbus Wins Order From Mexico's Volaris For 44 A320 Aircraft. There was only 28 Airbus A319/320/330 jets that Mexicana had in it's fleet when it went bankrupt 15 months ago.

Volaris seems to be planning to become the biggest airline in Mexico (by passengers carried).

Perhaps Aeromexico will become primarily an international airline. They are planning to buy 8 new Boeing 787's to replace their 6 Boeing 767's.

I don't see how Mexicana will find a place.

Quote: pacomartin

Volaris seems to be planning to become the biggest airline in Mexico (by passengers carried).

Good for them. I only wish they'd operate more flights from Toluca.

Quote:

I don't see how Mexicana will find a place.

Again, because Volaris and Viva are operating from Mexicana's slots and gates. Interjet acquired theirs from the defunct Aerocalifornia, so it's safe in Terminal 1.

However, the latest attempt to purchase and rescue Mexicana fell through. And I heard Volaris has gone to court to demand the right to acquire Mexicana's slots and gates. If it does, then Mexicana is through.

Quote: Nareed

And I heard Volaris has gone to court to demand the right to acquire Mexicana's slots and gates. If it does, then Mexicana is through.

Mexico has rapidly increased their narrow body jet fleet to 132 jets, so they have already replaced Mexicana capacity.
42 Aeromexico (narrow body full size jets only) Boeing 737 - 18 US destinations
33 Volaris - Airbus 319/320 - 7 US destinations
31 Interjet - Airbus 320 - 1 US destinations
17 Vivaerobus - Boeing 737 - 7 US destinations
09 Magnicharter - Boeing 737 - zero US destinations

Maybe with American Airlines in bankruptcy, the Mexican airlines will be able to get some of the routes to American cities.

Interjet came to San Antonio saying they had applied to begin a San Antonio-Toluca-Guadalajara route on Dec. 6 operating three days a week, one day after AirTran's annoucement.

"Altogether, that amounts to thousands of additional seats arriving from and departing to Mexico each week. San Antonio is Interjet's first U.S. destination. AirTran is positioning San Antonio as one of two airports, along with Orange County, to funnel passengers into and out of Mexico, making San Antonio a kind of a hub."

“San Antonio now has a premiere position into and out of Mexico,” Mayor Julian Castro said this week. “We've never had that before.”

Article

Quote: allenwalker

Interjet came to San Antonio saying they had applied to begin a San Antonio-Toluca-Guadalajara route on Dec. 6 operating three days a week, one day after AirTran's announcement.

From 1991 to 2010 Mexican Airlines have had virtually no increase in the number of passengers between Mexico and the United States. Most start up airlines in Mexico fail. And with Mexicana going bankrupt in August 2010, they lose the airline which controlled about half of the Mexican share of the air traffic going to USA.

In the same years 1991 to 2010, US airlines have tripled the number of passengers that they carry between the countries. You now have 21 different American airline companies with some share of this profitable pie. American, Continental, USAir, and Delta all had a larger share than Aeromexico last year.

In fairness it would be nice to see the Mexican airlines climb back up to 50% of the pie. That would strengthen their financial position so that they can improve domestic routes. Even if US airlines dominate the traffic to the resort cities, it would be nice if Mexican airlines controlled more of the traffic to urban areas. Most of these passengers are Mexicans or Mexican-Americans anyway.

Having lived in Mexico, I understand the frustration with the lack of affordable domestic air transport. You either pay an extortionate air fare, or you are faced with mind numbing 24 hour bus rides.


One third of the domestic air travel in 2010 was on just 6 routes, with 5 of them from Mexico City.

1	MÉXICO	CANCÚN	799 miles	1,974,000 psgrs	8.1%	8.1%
2	MÉXICO	MONTERREY	442	1,837	7.5%	15.6%
3	MÉXICO	GUADALAJARA	284	1,628	6.6%	22.2%
4	TIJUANA	GUADALAJARA	1,180	902	3.7%	25.9%
5	MÉXICO	TIJUANA	1,430	825	3.4%	29.3%
6	MÉXICO	MÉRIDA	620	756	3.1%	32.3%

We flew out of the Zacatecas airport, and they only had one airline, Mexicana. Now that Mexicana is bankrupt, they have flights to five cities on two airlines. The state has 1.5 million people, and it take forever to go somewhere by bus. You can't develop a modern economy without better air service.
Aeroméxico Connect-Mexico City: Volaris - Chicago-Midway, Los Angeles, Mexico City, Tijuana


One fourth of the International traffic is on the following 10 routes
LOS ÁNGELES GUADALAJARA
LOS ÁNGELES MÉXICO
HOUSTON CANCÚN
HOUSTON MÉXICO
NUEVA YORK CANCÚN
NUEVA YORK MÉXICO
MIAMI MÉXICO
DALLAS CANCÚN
ATLANTA CANCÚN
MÉXICO MADRID

Mexican airlines are expanding their presence in the USA.

Viva Aerobus is up to 6 cities in the USA (including Vegas)
Volaris is flying to 7 cities in the USA (including Vegas)
Aeromexico is flying to 15 cities in the USA (including Vegas)
Interjet to 2 (San Antonio & Miami)

Aeromexico has been flying to the US for a very long time now. Viva, Volaris and Interjet are new airlines.

I thought, BTW, you were going to bring up the latest attempt to rescue Mexicana. It would be funny if it weren't so sad. Every few months some group says "We'll do it!" Then there's a flurry in the media about it. then the funds fail to materialize. It's like mirages chasing something real.

Quote: Nareed

Aeromexico has been flying to the US for a very long time now. Viva, Volaris and Interjet are new airlines.

I included Aeromexico just for completeness. It would be nice if the Mexican airlines could take back at least half of the US/Mexican air traffic.
Aeromexico seems to have abandoned San Diego.

	Aeromexico	Aerobus	Volaris	Interjet
BROWNSVILLE	X
CHICAGO	X	X	X
DENVER	X
FRESNO	X		X
HOUSTON	X	X
LAS VEGAS	X	X
LOS ANGELES	X		X
MIAMI	X	X		X
NEW YORK	X
ONTARIO	X
ORLANDO	X	X
SACRAMENTO	X
PHOENIX	X
SAN ANTONIO	X	X		X
SAN DIEGO			X
SAN FRANCISCO	X		X
SAN JOSE			X

Ontario? Really? Why?

As to San Diego, I assume flying to Tijuana is cheaper, and it's rigth across the border.

And as predicted, the latest flurry in the news for a "rescue" of Mexicana has come to naught.

According to news reports Friday, Mexicana's being taken over by an investment firm called, fi I heard right Med Atlaantica (sound like an insurance company, doesn't it?)

I don't know if this is good news or not, especially for me. According to the news, Mexicana will get back all its slots and routes in Mex City's airport. But it also plans to begin with 7 planes and a handful of routes, and build up to 45 planes and more routes over 12 months. So it would seem the removal of Volaris, Viva and part of Interjet would happen gradually (Interjet owns slots and routes bought from the deceased Aerocalifornia).

I've no idea how this will affect Voalris' operations, and I planned on flying to Vegas on Voalris. Oh, I suppose they will try to hang on to their slots anyway, and there will be battles in court for months yet. But the way I see it, both Volaris and Interjet can move back some flights to Toluca, and Viva might as well. Volaris will keep the Guadalajara-Vegas route anyway.

And then, too, Mexicana operated 100+ planes when it suspended operations. Meaning even if it does reach the 45 plane goal ina year, they'd still need about ahlf the slots they had previously. So maybe not much will change for a while.

Still I'm not buying a plane ticket until I know there will be a flight available in May. We'll see.

Quote: Nareed

According to news reports Friday, Mexicana's being taken over by an investment firm called, fi I heard right Med Atlaantica (sound like an insurance company, doesn't it?)

Christian Cadenas from Med Atlantica
Christian is Spanish but 80% of the financing must come from Mexicans. Their identity is secret.

Seven planes is a pretty small airline. I wonder if they will concentrate solely on international routes.

double post

The latest, latest news is that no one knows whethere this si real, or whether we should update the old classic "Peter and the Wolf," to "Mexicana and the Judge."

Seriously, the judge in charge of the not-quite bankruptcy proceedings says the money's there. Some other authority (I didn't catch which one) says if the money's there, there should be a creditor's agreement or something like that. There isn't one. Yet.

I think my trip is safe. No way this will get settled by May the way things seem to be going.

More news. The judge in charge of the mess, or whatever, is saying the "creditor's agreement" (the local papers call it "convenio de acreedores") should be out in 3 weeks, whereupon things should start moving along. The question of course is whether he meant three weeks of human time or government time. I've seen three weeks turn into three years.

And then there are other hoops to jump through. There's been mention of "re-certifying" a host of permits, certificates, and other assorted waste paper. Not to mention employees, and, for some reason, performing test flights (to quote Victor Hugo "?")

So it seems like Mexicana will be back... someday.

No real news the past 3 weeks. That in itself is news, of sorts. It's beginning to look more and more like another bust. For sure Mexicana won't be back for some weeks yet.

One bit of news is that a governmetn bank (BANCOMEXT, don't ask) is said to have all of the planes Mexicana owned as colalteral for a loan. These are 5 to 7 craft, as news reports change a bit. The bank said it's negotiating to sell the planes to a leasing company or two. I've no idea if they can do that, or if leasing companies would buy them. Again it doesn't look good for Mexicana.

What all this means for me is I don't have to worry about Voalris being kicked out of Mex City's Juarez airport before I take my trip to Vegas...

Quote: pacomartin

Mexico has rapidly increased their narrow body jet fleet to 132 jets, so they have already replaced Mexicana capacity.
42 Aeromexico (narrow body full size jets only) Boeing 737 - 18 US destinations
33 Volaris - Airbus 319/320 - 7 US destinations
31 Interjet - Airbus 320 - 1 US destinations
17 Vivaerobus - Boeing 737 - 7 US destinations
09 Magnicharter - Boeing 737 - zero US destinations

Well, the airlines have added 6 new narrowbody jets since December, and Volaris has 57 jets on order. Mexicana is going to be lost if they don't get going soon.

45 Aeromexico (narrow body full size jets only) Boeing 737 - 16 US destinations
34 Volaris - Airbus 319/320 - 7 US destinations
33 Interjet - Airbus 320 - 2 US destinations
17 Vivaerobus - Boeing 737 - 6 US destinations
08 Magnicharter - Boeing 737 - zero US destinations

Quote: pacomartin

Well, the airlines have added 6 new narrowbody jets since December, and Volaris has 57 jets on order. Mexicana is going to be lost if they don't get going soon.

Not surprising, really, the downfall fo mexicana opened the doors wide for the new airlines to increase their market share. If/when Mexicana does return, they'll ahve to match them in prize, or overmatch them in convenience.

BTW, when Voalris and Interjet started, the latter looked like the 400 lb gorilla of the low-cost start-ups. Now Voalris has been moving more aggresively, particularly in international travel.

No further news yet. But lately I've been hanign around the web sites for Volaris and Interjet (partly planning my vacation, partly checking flight schedules for the boss), and I realized both these airlines have pretty much relegated Toluca as a secondary destination.

When they started back in '05 or so, they promoted the hell out fo Toluca. indeed, in their websites it was marked as "MEXICO CITY (Toluca airport)" The airport saw traffic surge from under 200,000 passengers a year to an eventual high of about 4 million (yes, I know that many fly out of just JFK every three minutes). The government of Mexico state spent a lot of money on 1) a freeway overpass on Paseo Tollocan to facilitate traffic to and from the airport, 2) adding lanes to Puerto Aereo Blvd. for the same reason and 3) expanding the airport terminal (in fact they added a whole terminal).

Alas, things change. To begin with an older airline, Aerocalifornia, went broke and sold to Interjet its slots at the Mexico City airport. Then Aviacsa got into regulatoryand financial trouble and shut down operations, which drew more flights to Mexico City. Along the way competing airlines also went broke and quit Toluca (small forgotten operators like Alma de Mexico and Avolar).

But things really exploded when Mexicana quit flying. Officially Mexicana still exists and still owns all slots and routes it did before it suspended operations (and the same is true of Aviacsa). In the meantime, Voalris and Interjet took them over to fill the void (so, too, did Viva Aerobus, but that didn't impact Toluca; Viva's hub is in Monterrey in the state of Nuevo León).

Volaris now operates only two routes from Toluca: Guadalajara and Cancun. Interjet has more, maybe 6, including flights to Monterrey, Acapulco and San Antonio, TX. This suggests to me Interjet won the middle and upper class market of people who live in the western part of Mexico City, and who can drive to Toluca airport easily. Interjet also operates an aircraft maintenance and refurbishing facility in Toluca, which draws a lot of customers flying the A-319/320 Airbus.

From the route map, it's clear Interjet has made Mexico City it's main hub. Volaris seems to have moved about half its operations to Mexico City, and the rest to Guadalajara. Indeed, when searching options for my trip to Vegas, it offered me a choice of a connection in Guadalajara (not coincidentally, Mexicana used to ahve that route as well).

I think Toluca now handles just under two million passengers per year. That's not bad, considering the few routes remaining, but it's a far cry from the heights achieved in 2010 before Mexicana went kaput. BTW Continental operates a single flight from Toluca to Houston daily, and FedEx runs one daily cargo flight to Memphis, TN.

Some news. The owner of most of the Mexicana stock, named Tenedora K, has agreed to sell it to Med Atlantica, the prospective new owner, for US 9 million. Allegedly the operation will be carried out on May 2nd. Med Atlantia claims to ahve US $350 million to invest on the airline.

Again, I'll believe it when/if it happens. But I'll admit I'm beginning to think of Mexicana's resurrection as half-likely. Still, it will be a few more weeks yet, if not months.

Quote: Nareed

Again, I'll believe it when/if it happens. But I'll admit I'm beginning to think of Mexicana's resurrection as half-likely. Still, it will be a few more weeks yet, if not months.

Ha! I called it.

The judge overseeing the proceedings, whatever they are, threw out the bid by Med Atlantica and abrred it from further aprticipation. There remain some suitors, but by now I'd say all that can be done for Mexicana is hold a memorial service and sell the brand to an existing airline. Perhaps Interjet or Voalris could use a "full-cost" wing to supplement their income...

Latest news:

"It's dead, Jim!"

Quote: pacomartin

Mexico has rapidly increased their narrow body jet fleet to 132 jets, so they have already replaced Mexicana capacity.
42 Aeromexico (narrow body full size jets only) Boeing 737 - 18 US destinations
33 Volaris - Airbus 319/320 - 7 US destinations
31 Interjet - Airbus 320 - 1 US destinations
17 Vivaerobus - Boeing 737 - 7 US destinations

It seems like since we made this list 14 months ago, that only Mexican flights out of Monterrey to the USA are decreasing. All three airlines in Mexico City are thriving.

41 Volaris - Airbus 319/320 - 10 US destinations
37 Interjet - Airbus 320 - 5 US destinations
45 Aeromexico (narrow body full size jets only) Boeing 737 - 19 US destinations
18 Vivaerobus - Boeing 737 - 3 US destinations

Aeromexico has 11 wide body jets for intercontinental destinations, Tokyo, Shanghai, Europe, and South America


In the USA the airlines are still mostly pulling back, reducing destinations and flights.

Quote: pacomartin

In the USA the airlines are still mostly pulling back, reducing destinations and flights.

Let any of the major carriers fail, and see if the others don't have a field day.

Quote: Nareed

Let any of the major carriers fail, and see if the others don't have a field day.

Over the ourse of history the USA has had dozens of airlines fail. Recently they just merge out of existence, with American & US Airways the next merger expected. Then there will only be 4 really national airlines and prices will go up even higher.

Domestic traffic for 2012

17.33% Southwest Airlines Co.
14.77% Delta Air Lines Inc.
10.59% United Air Lines Inc.

10.08% American Airlines Inc.
7.30% US Airways Inc.

4.56% ExpressJet Airlines Inc. (Delta Connection and United Express)
3.86% JetBlue Airways
3.82% SkyWest Airlines Inc. (regional partner with United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, US Airways, American Airlines and Alaska Airlines)
3.26% AirTran Airways Corporation (Southwest)
2.70% American Eagle Airlines Inc.
2.60% Alaska Airlines Inc.
2.13% Pinnacle Airlines Inc.
1.54% Frontier Airlines Inc.
1.40% Republic Airlines
1.36% Spirit Air Lines
1.33% Hawaiian Airlines Inc.
1.16% Mesa Airlines Inc.
1.09% Allegiant Air