Air Alps (A6, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)) is faced with a potential shareholding reshuffle amid reports that Welcome Air (2W, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)), the airline's largest shareholder with 76%, is looking to increase its stake in the struggling carrier. The news comes after it was recently announced that the local Green party in AltoAdige/Südtirol was pressuring the local government there to offload its 1.88% minority stake in Air Alps on the basis that it made "no economic, political or legal sense" to continue "wasting public funds" in the airline, which has thus far generated a loss of EUR10million. Air Alps has hobbled from one crisis to another with the coup de grâce coming last year with the loss of its Bolzano (BZO) to Rome Fiumicino Leonardo da Vinci International (FCO) flight contract. For its part, Welcome Air likely sees Air Alps as a panacea to its own problems in which ongoing talks with Russian investment group REFCA (Russian European Finance & Consulting Agency) could see a renewed Air Alps/Welcome Air tie-up relocating to Russia, though nothing concrete has been confirmed as yet.

Adria Airways (JP, Ljubljana Joze Pucnik (LJU)) is planning to retire three of its five CRJ-200s as part of its restructuring efforts later this year. The carrier is currently up for sale by the Slovenian government and bids have reportedly been received by InterSky (3L, Friedrichshafen Bodensee (FDH)) owner Intro Aviation, Denim Air ACMI (J7, Amsterdam Schiphol (AMS)) owner Panta Holdings and Welcome Aviation Group (which controls Air Alps (A6, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)), Tyrol Air Ambulance (TYW, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)) and Welcome Air (2W, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)) in Austria) according to EX-YU Aviation News. Adria Airways will temporarily operate charter services on behalf of charter broker Air Service Erfurt with one of its A319-100s on routes from Erfurt-Weimar Bindersleben (ERF), Kassel Calden (KSF) and Rostock Laage (RLG) to Spain during the month of April.

Air Alps (A6, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)) managing director Günter Gast has announced plans to wet-lease all of its three Do328-100 to a new Bryansk (BZK) based start-up backed by investment group Refca Group. The new airline plans to launch operations in early summer operating from Bryansk to both Moscow and St. Petersburg Pulkovo (LED). Refca is owned by Russian and Slovenian investors as well as Swiss investor Remi that also is the majority shareholder in Welcome Air (2W, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)) which in turn owns 76% of Air Alps.

Tyrolean Airways (VO, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)) has taken over Austrian Airlines (OS, Vienna International (VIE))' flight operations from July 1 and now operates 7 A319-100s, 9 A320-200s, 3 A321-100s, 3 A321-200s, 6 B737-800s, 6 B767-300s and 4 B777-200s on behalf of its parent. Austrian had forced its flight crews to either accept to work under the Tyrolean labour contract as of today or to leave the carrier. It hopes to save costs through the restructuring and merger of its flight operations on a single air operator certificate and labour contract. As a result of a fairly significant number of crews not accepting the transfer to Tyrolean, it currently wet-leases in six aircraft to continue to operate its scheduled as planned. Aircraft used include an A340-300 and a B737-300 from Lufthansa (LH, Frankfurt International (FRA)), a Fokker 100 from Contact Air (C3, Stuttgart Echterdingen (STR)), a EMB-190 from Augsburg Airways (IQ, Munich Franz Josef Strauss International (MUC)) and two Do328-100s from Welcome Air (2W, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)).

Welcome Air (2W, Innsbruck Kranebitten (INN)) is currently considering operating scheduled flights in its own right again. It has mentioned it is currently evaluating the Vienna International (VIE) - Bolzano (BZO) route. Welcome currently only operates charter flights with its two Do328-100s that will be operated on behalf of Austrian Airlines (OS, Vienna International (VIE)) from July 1 onwards.