Airline Profile: Air Canada
Canada's flagship air carrier, Air Canada operates an extensive domestic, trans-border and international network which, together with its Air Canada Jazz regional subsidiary provides direct services to over 150 destinations on five continents from primary hubs in Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and Calgary. A further dozen destinations are served through commercial agreements with unaffiliated regional airlines. Air Canada Jetz is a charter subsidiary.
History
Founded by Canadian National Railways as Trans Canada Air Lines (TCA) in April 1937, TCA's inaugural flight took off on 1 September 1937, a Lockheed 10A carrying two passengers and mail between Vancouver and Seattle.
By 1964, TCA had grown from a primarily domestic operator into Canada's national airline, and reflected this change by rebranding as Air Canada, and became fully privatised in July 1989. Following the 1995 Open Skies agreement with the US, Air Canada expanded trans-border services to become the leading provider of non-stop services to and from the US, operating around 1300 weekly flights to 42 destinations.
Air Canada was a founder member, along with Lufthansa, SAS, Thai and United Airlines,of the Star Alliance partnership in 1997.
At the end of 1999, the Canadian government relaxed some of the aviation regulations, aimed at facilitating a consolidation of the Canadian airline industry.
A takeover battle for the airline, with a bid made by Canadian investment company Onex (backed by Canadian Airlines shareholder American Airlines) floundered on rules limiting the ownership of Air Canada.
Air Canada subsequently launched a takeover bid for Canadian Airlines, which succeeded in January 2000 when Canadian’s shareholders including American, agreed to sell their shares, enabling Air Canada to amass 82 per cent of Canadian’s shares.
Air Canada filed for bankruptcy protection in April 2003, emerging successfully in September 2004 as a subsidiary of parent company ACE Aviation Holdings, and completed its IPO in April 2006, with shares traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX).
Fleet
- 83x Airbus A320 Family
- 8x Airbus A330
- 30x Boeing 767
- 16x Boeing 777
- 15x Embraer E-175
- 45x Embraer E-190
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