Yesterday, the SDL union, who represents pilots, flight attendants, and ground workers, staged the first strike on the new Alitalia, only one week after the relaunch of the carrier. The strike lasted for 4 hours, beginning at 10am, and was called in order to protest the policies for hiring new workers at the new airline.
Last Tuesday, wild protests at the airports in Milan and Rome caused some cancellations and delays, but the strike that occurred yesterday was the first strike to be scheduled for the new life of the company. However, in comparison to the disruption of big [...]

During the Christmas holiday, passengers amounting in the hundreds found themselves stranded at the Fiumicino Airport in Rome for the second day Tuesday in a row due to the most recent round of strikes from workers of Alitalia.  Alitalia ground service workers at the airport walked away from their jobs Monday in order to have union discussions about their futures, with a business consortium getting ready to relaunch the airline next year.
After almost 100 canceled flights on Monday, a further 43 services were canceled on Tuesday, according to the carrier.  Mirea Mitrofan, a passenger trying to get to Bucharest, [...]

The government has approved the €1 billion bid for Alitalia from the Italian Air Company, an investment consortium. Claudio Scajola, the Economic Development Minister, authorized Augusto Fantozzi, the special administrator over Alitalia, to move forward with selling the airline’s assets for no less than €1.052 billion.
The approval came last Wednesday during the final takeover stage, following the authorities of the European Union giving regulatory approval the week before and clearing the path for signing the final agreement with the Italian Air Company.
The restructured carrier is planned for relaunch on December 1st, which is two years after the Italian government [...]

Travelers faced more airport chaos while Alitalia planned on cutting 50 flights due to the strike action at airports in Italy. There were delays, cancellations, and long lines awaiting travelers following a wildcat strike involving some of Alitalia’s workers, forcing the airline to cut dozens of their flights. Some of the disputes were so heated that they were intervened by police.
On Tuesday, the second day in a row, dozens of flights with Alitalia were canceled due to protests by their staff, who are opposing a takeover by the Compagnia Aerea Italian group, forcing around 100 flights to be [...]

Alitalia is on the verge of rescue, as the state-controlled airline is being courted by an Italian investment consortium. However, the investors are threatening to pull their bid and funding guarantees unless Alitalia can guarantee union approval of the plan.
For days, the parties have been negotiating between airline employees, the head of CAI (the investment group involved in the bailout), and the airline itself. The head of CAI has informed the airline that, unless they can arrange for union approval of their plans, the investment group will pull their buyout offer. The Italian [...]

The Italian Government is hoping to talk Air France KLM into picking back up their merger discussions with the revamped Alitalia, following their help in destroying the previous agreement between the two carriers earlier in the year. The revamped Alitalia has managed to continue doing business thanks to investments, but they will have to eventually attract someone such as Lufthansa or Air France KLM as a foreign partner so that they can continue to operate in the long-run.

Altero Matteoli, the Infrastructure Minister, said during a conference that pending Air France KLM wants to collaborate with Alitalia now, they will [...]

Sixteen investors have made an agreement to participate in a relaunch of Alitalia, which is part of that plan in saving the troubled carrier, according to news reports on Tuesday. Included in the investors is Roberto Colaninno, who is the Chairman of Piaggio, among other Italian businessmen. The reports say that the investors have developed a new company, which is called the Italian Air Company, which will take over the profitable assets of Alitalia eventually. Colaninno will be come the Chairman, and Rocco Sabelli, another veteran executive, is anticipated to become the company’s Chief Executive Officer. [...]

The flight attendants of Alitalia have made the decision to show how displeased they are about the recent movements that Italian government officials and the airline have taken, organizing a symbolic strike to last one minute. Experts within the aviation industry believe that this could set a precedent for the country, as there have not been any one-minute strikes to be remembered recently. The one-minute walk-out is planned to occur on the 6th of next month, and all of the flight attendants for Alitalia will actually stop their work for one minute, as their form of protest. [...]

Lufthansa has showed an interest in Austrian Airlines by holding intense talks with Austria’s government, according to Stefan Lauer, an executive board member. The German airline is also keeping an eye on Alitalia in the Italian market, he said on Wednesday. Leaders in the Austrian government said during last week that they would sell part of their holding in Austrian Airlines, however, they want to keep enough to make sure that the Austrian core shareholders and the government have 25%. Lauer said that Austrian Airlines is a significant partner for them, and if the government goes to [...]

Some people believe that passengers don’t have to cry over some of the weaker airlines in Europe being put out of business because of the high price of fuel. Many of the airlines that are under a threat offer poor services, are surviving because their operations are conducted in a protected market, and fly very old aircrafts. Alitalia, for example, is only still running due to the government injecting millions into the company in order to keep it operating. Twenty years ago, the carrier was the behind of jokes, but not very much has gotten better since [...]