ABSTRACT
Inter-airline commercial agreements are a key management tool. They play an important role in the supply of air services on most international and many domestic airline markets. Over the years a very wide range of complex inter-airline agreements have grown up to meet specific airline needs. Agreements are sometimes purely technical and might, for instance, involve provision of engineering back-up by two airlines at each other’s home base or even joint maintenance of specific aircraft types in their fleets. Code-share and other similar agreements may be route specific, that is covering just one or a handful of routes, or they can be more regional, that is covering many routes to and from a particular geographic region or country. The airlines concerned normally enter into a bilateral commercial agreement prior to or after the equity investment or equity swap is made.
