MIAMI (Sputnik) – German air carrier Lufthansa's new project Eurowings will incorporate Germanwings brand, and is expected to become third largest carrier in Europe and Asia, Lufthansa Chairman and CEO Carsten Spohr told journalists.
"We are bundling our smaller operations under the brand of Eurowings to become not just the second tier of Lufthansa…but also to become the number one port to port carrier in our home markets — Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Belgium — eventually to become the third biggest port to port carrier in Europe, Asia," Spohr stated at the International Air Transport Association (IATA) summit on Sunday.
"By the end of this year we will move from the Germanwings brand to the Eurowings brand," Spohr said.
"That is also the plan we had before the accident, you might want to say that there is another argument now to do it, but with basically untouched booking numbers, that thing would not apply," Spohr added.
On March 24, the Germanwings Airbus A320 flying from Barcelona to Dusseldorf crashed in a remote area of the French Alps killing all 150 people on board. According to the information from the plane’s black boxes, copilot Andreas Lubitz deliberately crashed the plane after locking the pilot out of the cockpit.