A new Air Italy, slender and with the heart a Bologna. From England comes a plan to save the defunct Sardinian airline. At the bedside of the ex Meridiana an Anglo-French-American consortium comes forward. The leader is The entrepreneur-financier Oleg Evdomikov, but behind the scenes, from Great Britain, the strategic consultant is at work Longheadland, a British investment and management company. It has a rescue plan that revolves around two cornerstones: moving the base of operations to the airport Guglielmo Marconi and re-hire about 200 people (as a starting point).
The new shareholders would be a consortium made up of the US Ateo Air by Oleg Evdokimov, plus American and French funds. Evdokimov, a Russian financier-entrepreneur based in Cyprus, has been on the scene for a few months already, stepping forward for the company. So far he hasn’t found many ears willing to listen to him.
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The Ateo Air consortium
Now, however, the consortium is also enriched with a new partner: Longheadland of Paul Whelan, dean of the aviation sector in Italy: former shareholder of Aviapartner, a company that sorts the baggage of 38 airports around the world, and CEO of Prima Vista that manages waiting rooms and “side” services in airports (preferential lanes, meeting rooms, etc.), a business that will explode in the post-Covid world.
The rescue of Air Italy goes through a strong discontinuity: farewell to the historic operational base of Olbia, where in the 1960s the religious leader Aga Khan founded the Alifreckle to bring tourists to his resort, la Costa Smeralda (later sold to the American-Lebanese financier Tom Barrack and now owned by Smeralda Holding of Qatar). And just the Qatar had taken over the company from the Ishmaelite prince, who over time had become Sundial and then had incorporated the deceased Eurofly, renaming it Air Italy with great ambitions as an international company that competed with Alitalia. The registered office remained Olbia, but part of the base of operations had been moved to Milan Malpensa, from where flights to Miami e New York. But the adventure of the emirs did not last long: in February the company raised the white flag, putting itself in voluntary liquidation: the approximately 1,400 employees ended up in layoffs.
Between Covid and Qatar’s mistakes
Covid gave the final blow to the Sardinian carrier, but there was a strategic error, according to the analysis of LongheadLand: Qatar has underestimated the issue of labor costs which in the Gulf countries is a minor voice while in Italy it is a crucial economic factor. And then too much grandeur: Air Italy wanted to do too many things and all too soon. But the brand has its own strength and by moving the company to a more strategic airport for the country, even if still regional, the business can stand up and have prospects. The key points are: Bologna enjoys an optimal geographical position, in the center of the country; the catchment area it attracts is highly spending power and full of companies; the ADB airport company has excellent management. In addition, the new monorail that connects the airport to the railway station connects airplanes and high-speed trains: landing in Bologna, you can reach the whole country: Milan, Florence, Rome, Venice and the entire Adriatic coast.