Alitalia Doesn’t Exist Anymore, But Italy’s Still Paying 2,000 ‘Ghost’ Employees - View from the Wing
Alitalia became ITA Airways (Italia Trasporto Aereo) after a restructuring aimed at keeping Italy’s national airline afloat.
Before the pandemic Alitalia was losing 2 million euros a day. One financial backer after another has lost their investment. Air France walked away, and then Etihad came in to subsidize the carrier before it, too, lost its shirt.
The Italian government took over funding the carrier, and started looking for a buyer. At one point it looked like Delta, which had had a transatlantic revenue-sharing joint venture with Alitalia, would take over management of the airline. Lufthansa was ultimately selected as winning bidder, but there are now problems with that, too – the purchase contract allowed Lufthansa to pay less based on ITA Airways losses, and the government is not happy they exercised this clause.
Ultimately there wasn’t enough government subsidy and there was never willingness to deal seriously with Alitalia’s labor costs, union work rules, or the way the airline has been a political plaything for powerful interests for decades. In 2017 they filed bankruptcy in New York, days away from being kicked out of New York JFK over unpaid bills and having their U.S. phones turned off.
