Category Archives: Monarch Group

Greybull Capital finalizes its £165 million investment in Monarch Airlines

Monarch 737 MAX 8 (11)(Flt)(Boeing)(LR)

Monarch Airlines on October 12, 2016 announced the biggest investment in its 48 year history, a £165 million ($202.4 million) investment from its majority shareholder, Greybull Capital.

As a result of this investment Monarch has successfully renewed its ATOL licences from the CAA for the next 12 months and funded future growth plans.

In October 2014, Monarch announced an order for 30 Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft (above), with options for a further 15 planes. The first of these aircraft is due to be delivered in 2018.

The arrival of these state-of-the-art, fuel efficient aircraft in less than two years’ will enable Monarch to continue to provide passengers with a best in class inflight experience and allow the company to enjoy significant operational cost savings.

Andrew Swaffield, Chief Executive Officer of The Monarch Group, commented: “It is testament to the extensive effort by all parties, over the past weeks and months, that we are able to announce the largest investment in our 48-year history, as well as the renewal of our ATOL licences.

“I’d like to thank the CAA, our shareholders, partners, loyal customers and the team at Monarch for helping us to achieve this successful outcome. We are now firmly focused on the future as a stronger Monarch.”

Seabury Group LLC and Seabury Securities (UK) Ltd. served as financial advisor with respect to the recapitalisation.

Image: Boeing.

Greybull Capital is the preferred bidder to acquire Monarch Holdings Limited

Monarch Group (Monarch Airlines) has announced Greybull Capital LLP is the preferred bidder to acquired the group. The company has also announced that the various labor groups have agreed to major concessions to make the acquisition possible. The group issued these two statements:

The Board of Monarch Holdings Limited has announced that Greybull Capital LLP is the preferred bidder to acquire Monarch from the Group’s shareholders, principally the Mantegazza family.

Greybull is a family office with a focus on investing in private companies across a diversified range of industry sectors. Greybull backs incumbent management teams to support and invest into established businesses and brands and creates long-term sustainable and profitable businesses. It views an investment in Monarch as a long-term opportunity in a very strong brand with great potential in all of its markets, and intends to be supportive shareholders throughout Monarch’s next chapter.

Completion of a deal remains subject to the successful outcome of ongoing negotiations, whereupon Greybull intends to provide significant capital to Monarch in order to grow the Group and to capitalize on the long established and trusted brand name.

Conditional upon the successful conclusion of these negotiations with Monarch stakeholders, a transaction is expected to complete towards the end of October.

The Monarch Group has also confirmed that each of its staff groups has agreed to major concessions on pay and terms and conditions as part of its plan to evolve into a leading scheduled European low-cost airline.

Following supportive discussions with union representatives of BAPLA, the pilots union, and UNITE, which represents its cabin crew and engineers, staff were balloted on the proposed changes and on average more than 90% voted in favour, with a proportionately high level of staff deciding to vote.

Results showed pilots voted 96% in favor with over 90% of cabin crew voting yes and engineers at Monarch Aircraft Engineering Limited (MAEL) also voting 88.43% in favor.

The changes impact all areas of the business and involve concessions of up to 30% in salaries, as well as changes to working patterns and other conditions.

Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com. Airbus A321-231 G-OZBO (msn 1207) prepares to land at Tenerife Sur.

Monarch Airlines:

Monarch Group returns to the black for its fiscal year

Monarch Group (Monarch Airlines) (London-Luton), the UK’s leading independent travel group, has announced its unaudited results for the Financial Year ended October 31, 2013.

Commenting on the Group’s 2013 performance and the outlook for 2014, Executive Chairman, Iain Rawlinson, said:

“I am delighted to announce the return to profitability of The Monarch Group in 2013. This was the outcome targeted by our 2011 refinancing, which was based on a clear plan that combined the achievement of business efficiencies and intra group synergies with growth strategies for each business area. All these elements have been delivered in tough markets.

“Whilst we are encouraged by the more positive recent economic news of late, in the short-term there remains overcapacity in the aviation industry and we believe many travel customers are cautious about the economic outlook. However, our Group structure, combining the three mutually supporting business areas of the scheduled airline, tour operations and aircraft engineering, each with its own independent growth strategy, provides us with resilience in this very competitive market environment.

“The actions we have taken in the last two years provide strong foundations from which to plan the next phase of growth and development. Our steady investment in this period – in strengthening the group and divisional management, raising awareness of our trusted travel brands, improving distribution, introducing business efficiencies, and answering the needs of customers – provides a strong platform from which to complete our modernisation agenda. ”

Summary (October 31 year-end)

KEY STATISTICS	2013 Unaudited Statutory	2012 Statutory	Change
Gross turnover (£m)	1,237.5	1,071.5	+15.5%
Monarch Airlines (£m)	763.2	683.5	+11.7%
Tour Operations (£m)	336.4	291.4	+15.4%
Monarch Aircraft Engineering (£m)	107.2	86.3	+24.2%
Other (£m)	30.7	10.3	+198.1%
Turnover, net of intra-Group sales (£m)	960.5	825.1	16.4%
Web traffic – unique visitors (m)	21.9	20.0	+9.5%
Gross e-commerce revenue (£m)	520.0	479.0	+8.6%

2013 Group Highlights

All trading divisions profitable for the year on a pre-exceptionals basis
Successfully delivered efficiency programs, achieving annualised cost savings of £52 million and increase in intra group turnover of an additional £31 million
Investment of some £20 million in aircraft engineering facilities, and systems to increase operating capacity and improve efficiency
Significant increase in unique visitors to the Group’s e-commerce platforms, up 10% to 22 million
Group-wide roll out of Olympics-inspired ‘WorldHost’ Customer Service programme
Launch of The Monarch Foundation, providing focus for charitable and CSR activities

Monarch Airlines in FY2013

11.7% increase in gross revenues to £763.2 million
10.1% increase in capacity to 8.1 million sector seats and on track to deliver 10 million sector seats by end 2016
9.5% increase in airline passenger volumes to 7.0 million
Advanced plans to order up to 60 new narrow body aircraft in Q1 2014 (valued at US$6 billion at list prices) to continue fleet renewal program
New base at Leeds-Bradford Airport established
UK network development so that over two thirds of the UK population lives within a 90 minute drive of one of Monarch’s six bases[1]
New advertising campaign to be launched Christmas 2013 emphasising Monarch Airlines’ customer service heritage and commitment to providing “Superior Customer Experience at Competitive Price”

Tour Operations in FY2013

15.4% increase in gross revenues to £336.4 million
12% growth in passenger volumes to 911,000, substantially out-performing the market
18% growth in Package Holiday volumes, continuing the trend for consumers to seek ‘care, convenience and financially protected holidays’[2]
5.6% increase in unique visitors to package holiday websites to 9.3 million
Successful migration to new, flexible enterprise technology platform
Continued investment in differentiated offer for customers

Monarch Aircraft Engineering in FY2013

24.2% increase in revenues to £107.2 million
26% growth in revenue from 3rd party customers
80% increase in maintenance capacity following the opening of a new state-of-the-art facility at Birmingham Airport
Introduced Bombardier and Embraer type aircraft servicing capability

Copyright Photo: Ton Jochems/AirlinersGallery.com. Monarch Airlines is reviewing tender offers from the manufacturers and is expected to place a large aircraft order up to 60 aircraft in early 2014. A new order with Airbus is expected. Airbus A321-231 G-ZBAF (msn 2730) is seen in action at Palma de Mallorca.

Monarch Airlines: