RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The regional air market has just moved with a new alliance between two leading airlines operating in Latin America. Avianca announced that they would form a single group together with Brazil’s GOL. Now, both airlines will be grouped under the holding company Grupo Abra.
It is a strategic move by Avianca, in addition to the one it had already made with the purchase of 100% of the shares of the low-cost airline Viva.
The airline with which Avianca allied itself, GOL Linhas Aéreas, has its hub in Rio de Janeiro and is also the second-largest and most important airline in Brazil and the third-largest in Latin America, with 28% of the Brazilian domestic air market and 15% of the international market in that country.
Thus, if the merger between Avianca and Viva is consolidated, Avianca would have a share of 188 routes in the Group with connections to 94 destinations and a fleet of 141 aircraft. On the other hand, GOL would add more than 60 domestic destinations in Brazil with flights to several destinations in South America and the Caribbean. In addition, GOL has invested in charter flights to Miami, Orlando, and New York and has scheduled flights to the United States.
In the case of operating revenues, when analyzing the 2020 figures, the leading company was Latam, with revenues of US$4.3 billion, followed by Avianca with US$1.7 billion: Aeroméxico, which reached US$1.4 billion; GOL, with US$1.2 billion, and closes the top five, Azul, which reached US$1.1 billion in 2020.