The payment of 817 million pesos for Mexicana assets is “generous”, they estimate

The payment of 817 million pesos in which the Mexican government agreed to purchase most of the assets of the extinct airline Mexicana de Aviación is “generous”, considering that the brand no longer has a commercial presence.

“The brand has a significant depreciation because it stopped operating almost thirteen years ago and it stopped investing in advertising, in addition to the fact that today the air market conditions are different; the payment is undoubtedly generous”, affirmed a market consultant who preferred not to be quoted.

Last Friday, the Mexican government announced an agreement to close the purchase of most of the remaining assets of Mexicana de Aviación, a company that ceased operations at the end of August 2010 and in 2014 was declared bankrupt after failing its process to get out of bankruptcy.

The sale includes 23 brands, including the one considered to be of the highest value, that is, Mexicana de Aviación, as well as the Mexicana Training Center along with two simulators for 727 aircraft used by the Air Force and an Airbus 320, the latter is the highest value; as well as a flat in the Balderas building, in Mexico City and a building in Guadalajara, Jalisco.

The brands alone were valued at 407 million 441,000 pesos, while the Guadalajara building at 86 million 171,000 pesos and the one in Mexico City at 28 million 991,000 pesos.

Meanwhile, the value of the Technical Training Center was set at 207,7000 pesos and the flight simulators, 83,473,335 pesos.

These assets would form part of the assets of the new airline that the government plans to establish and that would be managed by retired members of the Mexican army.

At the time of its cessation of operations, Mexicana de Aviación remained the leading company in the Mexican market, which in 2010 saw the rise of the business model of low-cost airlines, which prevails today.

“Today the market is different and the business model of legacy airlines –as it was Mexicana– has been the most challenged in recent years, as the Covid-19 crisis demonstrated with examples such as Aeroméxico, which had to restructure” affirmed the consultant.

This does not mean that the new state airline will “inherit” the business model of Mexicana de Aviación, but it does call into question the advisability of paying more than 800 million pesos for the brand and assets of a defunct company, when the The government could invest less by starting its own business identity from scratch, he said.

Workers accept the sale

For now, the almost 8,000 former employees of Mexicana de Aviación took the first step on Friday to carry out the sale of the assets to the Ministry of Infrastructure, Communications and Transportation, for an amount of 817 million pesos.

“The first thing was to accept the offer presented by the Infrastructure Secretariat, after an appraisal, by all the former workers of Mexicana de Aviación, and next Tuesday, January 10, the union organizations; that is, pilots, flight attendants, ground workers, retirees, we will have to give up all the lawsuits that have been filed over these 12 years in the Federal Board of Conciliation and Arbitration”, explained Jose Gerardo Alonso Torres, spokesperson for the Association Aviation Pilots Union (ASPA).

Despite the fact that the awards that have been presented in the last 12 years exceed 9,000 million pesos, for the workers the sale of part of the assets of Mexicana de Aviación represents a way out to grant a part of the settlement to the workers.

“It is not recovering, if it had been settled as established in the contract, each worker would have obtained much more money, but since it is bankrupt it will touch them approximately, because it is still not well known, between 5 and 10% of what It would have been a normal liquidation”, added Alonso Torres.

empresas@eleconomista.mx