Air Transport

Middle Eastern carrier Gulf Air is denying that it has entered any arrangement with Regional Paraguaya despite the South American carrier's marketing a virtually-identical livery on its Internet site.

Regional Paraguaya has been displaying images of Boeing 737-200 aircraft in gold and blue colours, with a falcon logo and lettering which closely resemble those on Bahrain-based Gulf Air's own scheme.

Gulf Air chief executive Bjorn Naf tells Flightglobal premium sister publication Air Transport Intelligence that it "absolutely" did not sanction any use of the livery by the Paraguayan airline. "Only the feet of the falcon are missing," he says, adding that lawyers for Gulf Air are studying the matter.

While Naf states that Gulf Air is intending to change its livery as part of its latest strategy, he insists there has been no agreement to sell the rights to the current scheme, which was created by design company Landor.

Regional Paraguaya could not immediately be reached to comment. The relatively young airline is based in Asuncion and is building a network of routes to major cities across South America.

Its current livery is a simple scheme comprising an all-white fuselage and the blue-and-red Regional Paraguaya bird motif on the fin.