Airliners.net

The "battle" continues...

http://www.forbes.com/markets/feeds/afx/2006/12/15/afx3258420.html

Deutsche Lufthansa AG has accused Frankfurt Hahn Airport of allegedly granting indirect payments to Irish budget airline company Ryanair Holdings Plc.


PH

What will Fraport say as they are owners of this airport , and LH has 5% shares of Fraport .

Maybe this is the revenge for the "Better Fly" ban .

Another interesting article (German only):
http://onwirtschaft.t-online.de/c/99/26/13/9926136.html


PH

Quoting LHStarAlliance (Reply 1): Maybe this is the revenge for the "Better Fly" ban .

Sorry, could you please fill me in on the "better fly ban"?

The 5% shares LH has in Fraport may give them a seat on the board at the most but not the influence they have as Fraport's single largest customer.

HHN is 65% owned by Fraport, the balance is with the states of Hesse and Rhineland-Palatine. The corporation is a limited company, (GmbH) which basically can sign any contract with anybody and marketing payments do not necessarily mean that these are state subsidies, unless they flow direct from public funds. HHN still loses money, for which the shareholders sign, but the losses are usually activated on the balance sheet or absorbed by fresh capital.
Could be that the two states imvolved grant marketing payments to HHN so they can "afford" FR as a customer.

Would really be interesting to see how LH justifies their claim, they do similar deals all over the world - PDX for instance.

The better fly thing was that Ryanair sued LH over their advertisement for 99€ European fares which ended up at 109€ including the ticket service charge (internet only)

Quoting LHStarAlliance (Reply 1): What will Fraport say as they are owners of this airport , and LH has 5% shares of Fraport .

LH holds 5% of a company that holds another company that operates an airport that allegedly illegally subsidized a competitor of LH. Quite a distant relationship to exert managerial pressure on the Hahn airport operator ...