IAG Is Serious About Growing Its Low-Cost, Long-Haul Airline
Photo Credit: A Level plane. Parent company IAG is planning to make the virtual airline an official one. IAG
Skift Take
IAG's testing of the low-cost, long-haul market with a virtual airline seems to have paid off. Its success shows that the model is here to stay. We'll be keeping a close eye on how this affects the legacy carriers, including those in IAG's own brand stable.
When IAG launched Level, its low-cost, long-haul airline in March this year, nobody was quite sure whether it was something the company was genuine about or simply an attempt to outmuscle airlines like Norwegian, which were already active in the segment.
The fact that it was launched so quickly — and that it operated under Iberia’s air operator’s certificate, or AOC — gave the impression that it might not last long, especially as some previous airlines within airlines had largely been failures.
Seven months on and IAG Chief Executive Willie Walsh says the brand is “doing extremely well” and will shortly get its own air operator’s certificate, a dedicated CEO, and a second operating base. Th
