Delta and Northwest have put up a website, announced a merger, , and are scheduled to webcast their official press conference on Tuesday morning. Such a move can trigger a wave of additional consolidation within the industry, as airlines line up to compete with a new mega-carrier.
The consolidation of services, like with USAirways, once the dust settles, can be beneficial. However, the hardships of USAirways created many problems which will take more time to sort out. Even if Northwest and Delta learn from these mistakes, issues of workforce integration and consolidation, as well as IT and infrastructure issues are still significant problems.
Fares will continue to rise, with or without the merger. So, let’s take a look at the advantages routewise. Neither carrier overlaps significantly on its domestic or international service. Both are already alliance partners. We’re unsure of what name the newly reorganized airline will take, but we’ll find out tomorrow.
The consolidation of services will likely see route optimization calculations. They promise on their website that there will be no hub closures, but there may be route alignment as they attempt to best use their resources. We doubt that no flights will be cut in the final integration, but hopefully it will clean things up a bit. For example, we doubt that Delta will continue its regional flights from JFK to Detroit when Northwest operates regular service.
What are your thoughts? We’d love to hear them.