BA Iberia and AA enter joint business agreement

American Airlines (AA), British Airways (BA) and Iberia have signed a joint business agreement on the operation of transatlantic flights.

The consortium of airlines has claimed that the agreement will benefit all customers by providing increased choice through better connections and improved flight schedules to destinations around the world.

As part pf the deal, each airline will co-operate commercially on providing flights between Canada, the USA and Mexico, as well as within Scandinavia and Europe.

The flag carriers heralded the new agreement as "a significant step towards strengthening customer choice", because customers would now be able to travel more easily on a combined route network of 443 destinations in 106 countries.

Willie Walsh, chief executive of British Airways claimed: "This strategic relationship strengthens competition by providing consumers with easier journeys to more destinations with better aligned schedules and frequencies."

The new deal has been met with a mixed response by some of the airlines' competitors, with Virgin Atlantic claiming that allowing the agreement to go ahead would create a "monster monopoly" that would have negative effects for passenger with increased ticket prices and reduced competition between airlines on transatlantic routes.

Virgin president Richard Branson said: "It will be bad for passengers, bad for competition and bad for the UK and US aviation industry."

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