Europe Airpost, a supplier of air capacity to DHL Express and La Poste, has denied rumours thatthe company is for sale or that it is delaying the delivery of new aircraft destined for DHL.
Parent company ASL Aviation Group told CEP-Research today that the first of two B737-400freighters to serve DHL had already entered service, with the second expected next month.
The company dismissed a report in a French business newspaper claiming ASL was seeking a buyerbecause of competition in the passenger airline business and that Europe Airpost itself was forsale. It said the report had “numerous errors”, and denied that CEO Jean-François Dominiak had madeany statement to employees about ownership changes for Europe Airpost.
A spokesperson told CEP-Research: “I can confirm that Jean-Francois Dominiak has not spoken infront of the Comité d’entreprise. Neither has he made any statement or announcement about a changein ownership or possible sale of Europe Airpost.”
ASL acknowledged that Europe Airpost has revised down its forecast of passenger activity to18,000 flight hours, due to “aggressive competition in the French tourism passenger market”, butsaid Europe Airpost and ASL were in extremely good shape financially, posting profits of €3 millionand €30 million, respectively.
“With the strengthening of its diversification strategy for the cargo business, Europe Airpostexpects growth of around 15% for this activity. In order to face the demands of its customers,Europe Airpost announced, on June 4th, the arrival of two Boeing 737-400 freighters to its fleet.One is already in operation, and the other one will be online in the coming days.”
These were to operate for DHL this year, before moving onto a recently extended contract with LaPoste from 2013.
ASL has provided air capacity for many years to DHL and DHL’s aviation subsidiary EAT via ASL’sIreland-based Air Contractors business, but since January, Europe Airpost has also been flyingthree aircraft on DHL’s European express delivery network.
The spokesperson told CEP-Research that because the ASL Group had grown considerably over thelast few years, ASL’s two shareholders, CMB Group and 3P Air Freighters, had announced in Februarythat they had decided to appoint Citigroup as advisors “to assist in exploring potential strategicoptions for ASL, in order to allow ASL to continue to grow”.
The spokesperson said this was the “latest information regarding the shareholding of the Group”,adding: “As indicated, this is a positive statement towards facilitating further growth anddevelopment of the Group.”
Sources at ASL insisted that there had been no announcement to staff about new ownership andthat they were not aware of any action on the basis of the Citigroup consultation.
