Aerosvit founder believes it is early to name company bankrupt

KYIV, January 19 /UKRINFORM/. Ukraine International Airlines co-owner and former founder of Aerosvit Aron Maiberg believes that it is early to name Aerosvit as bankrupt. On the contrary, according to him, attempts are made for the company recovery.

Maiberg has said about this in an interview to Forbes.ua.

“It is impossible to say that Aerosvit is a bankrupt. Still, we do not pin this label on the company. It is more correct to say that the air carrier got into a quandary. What I see and hear, communicating with Aerosvit stockholders testifies to the fact that there are no plans to bring the company to bankruptcy, on the contrary, attempts are made for its recovery,” the businessman has said who had sold its stake in Aerosvit several years back and went to the competitor company.

Maiberg also denied a version about possible merger of Aerosvit and Ukraine International Airlines “There is Aerosvit - this is a legal person. The company has its business, its development program. There is Ukraine International Airlines, which has its development plan, its strategy. Our company lives in the aviation space and attentively monitors the processes taking place in it, both in Ukraine and beyond its borders. If Aerosvit stops any flight, and we have technical and legal possibilities to fly on this route and it seems economically profitable for us, we have a right to start those flights.”

For this, according to him, technical possibility is necessary. “If you want to ask whether Ukraine International Airlines is going to take any aircraft from Aerosvit - no, there are no such plans. Moreover, according to my information, Aerosvit has not own aircraft, all of them are on lease,” Maiberg said.

Answering a question whether Ukraine International Airlines will use the situation into which their competitor got, he said: “Naturally, we are trying to use any convenient possibility for improvement of our business.”

Speaking about a role of Ukraine International Airlines in saving Aerosvit, the company co-owner noted that that “the first priority task is to help Aerosvit to convey passengers. We agreed that the company will settle with us as soon as its financial state improves. A task number two is to determine how it is possible to stabilize the situation in general.”

There can be many variants according to Maiberg. “For instance, we can start flying in those directions, where Aerosvit stopped its flights. This is one more proof that no merger is prepared. If we planned this, Ukraine International Airlines will enter those routes first and Aerosvit would leave them only after that.

“We will consider an issue of the change of our strategy due to the situation that had formed, but this is not a transient process,” Maiberg summed up.