Ryanair CEO calls his carrier the winner in Lufthansa-ITA deal

Ryanair Holdings Plc’s Chief Executive Officer Michael O’Leary said the low-cost carrier will emerge as a winner from rival Deutsche Lufthansa AG’s €325 million ($353 million) investment in Italy’s ITA Airways, as more slots come up for grabs to secure regulatory approval. 

“We support Lufthansa buying ITA,” O’Leary said in an interview in Rome on Tuesday. “It will create more growth opportunities for Ryanair in Italy.” Under the deal, the German airline would initially buy 41% of the successor to failed flagship Alitalia from the Italian state, with an option to acquire the rest at a later date.

O’Leary made the comments ahead of a move by European Union watchdogs to open an in-depth probe into the transaction. Paving the way for more slot concessions, regulators said a package of commitments offered so far by Lufthansa was “insufficient, in terms of both scope and effectiveness, to clearly dismiss” its competition concerns on long- and short-haul connections.

Aside from helping Ryanair, O’Leary warned that if the deal goes through, the German carrier “will increase all the airfares,” on the routes involved. “Rather than growing routes to and from Italy they will just use it to feed the hubs in Munich and Frankfurt.”

The CEO said his company’s plan to add seven routes from Rome and ten from Milan area hubs demonstrates a commitment to continue investing “strongly” in the country. 

The company expects traffic in Italy to grow least 10% this year to over 60 million passengers, O’Leary said.

“We see a lot of inbound traffic that wants to come to Italy, tourism across Europe is recovering post-Covid and Italy has been one of the biggest beneficiaries,” the CEO said.

Dublin-based Ryanair has often clashed with Lufthansa on the European stage, winning an EU court fight over a €6 billion-euro recapitalization approved by the European Commission. Ahead of that ruling he said Lufthansa enjoys a “quasi-monopoly” in its home market.