Virgin Express (VIRGY) Richard Branson's European Airline Message Board

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Non-Tech : Virgin Express (VIRGY) Richard Branson's European Airline

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To: Mike Fox who wrote (1)	3/1/1999 11:55:00 AM
From: AC Flyer	of 62

News Story, Virgin Group... Britain's Virgin Launches New BA Offensive LONDON (Reuters) - British entrepreneur Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic Airways promised a new onslaught on arch rival British Airways Plc Monday, with the launch of new routes and frequencies this year and a new corporate look next year. It started ticket sales Monday for a fifth daily service between London's Heathrow and New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport starting June 9 and its new twice weekly flights to Shanghai starting May 22. And the airline said it expects 2,000 more people to join Virgin Atlantic's parent Virgin Travel Group's work force of 6,500 over the next 12 months to staff new services. It also said Virgin's new corporate look would feature use of the Union Jack to attack BA's decision two years ago to replace its own abstract of the national flag on its tailfins with a range of multicultural ethnic designs. ''We will have a unique new look. ... It will include the Virgin logo, the Virgin red and the Union Jack and hopefully we won't alienate our passengers in the process,'' he said, in reference to the howls of protest which greeted BA's decision to remove its own version of the flag in a move to internationalize. In addition to the Shanghai and New York services the company said it hoped to launch a new service from London Heathrow to Chicago in August, and was looking at a number of other routes longer term, including to Lagos, Nigeria. However, the spokesman denied recent local press reports which suggested Virgin was to sign a 15-year collaboration deal with Nigeria Airways Monday. Virgin said the main focus of expansion was to win more of BA's lucrative business travel customers and in particular win a greater share of the market for corporate accounts. ''This gives Virgin the ability to go to corporate clients with a bigger network,'' he said. Funding is not seen as a problem and the airline says there are no current plans to float shares in the airline or seek a trade investor. He said Virgin Travel Group is expected to make a profit of over 100 million pounds ($160 million) on sales of more than one billion pounds ($1.6 billion) in the current year ending April 30. In the previous year, it earned 89 million pounds ($142 million) on sales of 945 million pounds ($1.5 billion). Reut11:13 03-01-99

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