MAT Macedonian Airlines - Planned Takeover By Jat

Planned Takeover By Jat

MAT Macedonian Airlines and Jat Airways signed the Intention agreement on finding the best business solution for the future cooperation between the two national carriers of Macedonia and Serbia. Both companies stated that the interest is shown for establishing various forms of cooperation, from technical to commercial.

In the year 2008 Alexander The Great Airport provided service to more than 660.000 passengers while MAT served 37 per cent on the flights to Zurich, Vienna, Düsseldorf, Rome, Istanbul, Hamburg, Berlin and Amsterdam and Jat served 10 per cent. By improving the companies’ partnership, services for the Macedonian passengers will gain additional possibilities.

The agreement was signed in Belgrade by Jat Acting Director General Sasa Vlaisavljevic and the president of MAT’s Board of Directors, Zlatko Petrovski.

Despite MAT recently being grounded by aviation authorities in Macedonia, Jat’s CEO has confirmed that the Serbian carrier will take over shares and revive the national Macedonian carrier. Jat’s team of legal experts are currently in Skopje where they are checking MAT’s legal and financial documentation. These checks should be complete within a week. The findings will be presented to Jat’s management board, after which, the Serbian carrier will send MAT a proposal whether it will take over a majority of shares (over 50%) or less than 50% of shares. The documentation checks have taken longer than expected because MAT did not immediately provide all the necessary paperwork. Also, Jat’s legal team requested more information regarding MAT’s financial reports. Jat’s CEO confirmed that MAT has extreme debt but declined to comment further. He stated that Jat is primarily interested in the Macedonian aviation market which is covered 35% by MAT, while Jat has a share of 10% in the market. “We are also interested in commencing flights from Belgrade and Skopje to Priština through MAT”, Saša Vlaisavljević, the airline’s CEO says. Jat is currently banned from flying to Priština due to the unresolved status of Kosovo in which Priština is located.

In October 2009, Jat Airways does not have any intentions with MAT Macedonian Airlines, instead they have planned an airline for Republic of Macedonia called Aeromak.