[eganist]

I'm probably oversimplifying, but Alaska + Hawaiian creates a larger regional competitor to e.g American, United, and Southwest on a more local scale where most of their routes are complimentary (the two weren't substantially competing; Alaska offers a handful of CONUS to Hawaii routes, whereas Hawaiian offers CONUS as well as international routes to/from Hawaii), whereas JetBlue acquiring Spirit consolidates nationwide low-cost carriers and reduces low-cost competition

[xvector]

On a side note, I find it interesting that JetBlue is considered "low cost" but has the absolute best domestic business class by a long shot.

[mmcconnell1618]

I've always considered JetBlue to be a value leader vs. low cost leader. They have nicer seats, in seat entertainment in all classes and have a pricing/refund/exchange policy that is more customer friendly than competitors. Spirit is just going for low cost. Southwest is in between where they want low cost but you have to fight for a seat and might needs to have 2 or 3 stops to cross the country depending on where you start.

I assume you're talking about JetBlue's Mint product which is all business class for some cross country flights and a few international. Again, I think they are trying to provide the best value for business class compared to the larger carriers.

[trbleclef]

They also have free wifi, which even Southwest still doesn't offer.

[stevehawk]

The problem is that Spirit is but going to survive 2024. Between their debt situation and a number of their A320 Neos about to be grounded thanks to a Pratt and Whitney eff-up, they won't be around long enough to keep anything competitive.

[babyshake]

If this is the case, then an acquisition to prevent a competitor from going bankrupt should generally not be anti-competitive? Since, they would no longer be your competition anyways?

[mathgeek]

It could be seen as pro consumer, but it also could be seen as anti competitive. Spirit going under would open up space for a new competitor to potentially move in.

An analogy would be two competing gas stations at a very busy intersection with no plots nearby to build more stations. Just by existing they either drive each other down on price or collude on it. One going under means a new station could exist, but one buying the other guarantees prices do not go down.

[kelnos]

If that's the case, why does JetBlue want to acquire them now? Why not wait until they file for bankruptcy protection, and likely get a much better deal?

[ceejayoz]

They'll have to compete with others on all the individual bits that way. No one else wants all of Spirit, but given the opportunity to pick and choose, some aircraft and landing slots are likely to be competed for.

[cjrp]

And their share price has just tanked ~50%. Maybe that was the plan all along...

[vlovich123]

I’m honestly surprised at how small the breakup fee was compared with Adobe/Figma. I guess the difference of negotiating from a position of strength vs weakness.

[vlovich123]

It would probably still have an effect of raising prices for flights to/from Hawaii no?

[eganist]

Possibly, but it's not as abrupt and obvious as with JetBlue/Spirit, who both compete in the exact same market in modestly different ways. Alaska and Hawaiian have limited regional overlap with flights from certain west coast cities to certain islands, but beyond that, Alaska would be getting Hawaii's entire international route network and tying it in with their entire CONUS domestic route network.

The more interesting transaction that arguably should've been stopped was Alaska purchasing Virgin America as they were both largely west coast airlines. But amazingly enough (as someone who held status on VA and later Alaska), my flights actually got cheaper after that merger, and I was consistently upgraded too. So if that merger hadn't happened, my experience would've been worse.

[bobthepanda]

That's easy enough to address with selling off Hawaii slots.

To put this in perspective, 60 out of 566 JetBlue and Spirit routes overlap. Alaska and Hawaiian share 12 routes out of 336.