United Airlines drops merger pursuit with American, CEO Kirby details why

United Airlines on Monday announced that it’s ending its pursuit of a potential merger with American Airlines after its rival rebuffed an initial approach to discuss a deal.

United CEO Scott Kirby said in a statement published on Monday that he approached American Airlines about a potential merger because he “thought we could do something incredible for our customers together.”

“I was confident that this combination, which would have been about adding and not subtracting, creating a truly great airline that customers love, could get regulatory approval,” he said. 

“I was hoping to pitch that story to American, but they declined to engage and instead responded by publicly closing the door. And without a willing partner, something this big simply can’t get done,” Kirby said.

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American CEO Robert Isom on Thursday said the airline wasn’t interested in a potential merger with United, saying it would be bad for all parties involved.

“The idea of the two largest airlines in the world getting together, that is something that we’ve viewed as being anti-competitive and obviously everybody that has weighed in suggests the same thing,” Isom said. “Bad for customers, bad for the industry and ultimately, that would be bad for American Airlines.”

Kirby acknowledged that “American’s public comments make it clear that a merger like this is off the table for the foreseeable future,” but said that his vision for a merger between United and American involved using the scale of the combined airline to compete and lead around the globe.

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He wrote that the combined airline would have had opportunities to grow internationally and with expanded service to smaller communities, noting that both of those goals “are mathematically enabled by having a larger network.”

Kirby said that he thought a merger between United and American would have increased the total number of economy seats in the marketplace to give cost-conscious consumers more affordable options and choice, while the scale would boost competitiveness for international flights.

He also thought the combined company would’ve “created tens of thousands of new high-paying, unionized jobs with great benefits which would have led to even more career growth opportunities for the 250,000 employees already at United and American,” and also supporting domestic aircraft manufacturing.

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Kirby said he understood the scale of the merger would attract skepticism because “previous mergers have been about saving struggling airlines, previous legal and regulatory reviews have focused on subtraction and what’s being lost,” whereas he thought this merger proposal would be viewed as a “different proposition altogether.”

“While our pursuit of talks with American have ended, our mission to build the greatest airline in the history of aviation at United is well underway. We have a winning strategy, a culture of innovation and 115,000 of the best aviation professionals in the world working together to deliver for our customers,” Kirby wrote. 

“While the airline industry has always been dynamic and unpredictable (it’s one of the reasons that I love this business), United’s future is brighter than it’s ever been,” he added.