(Bloomberg) -- Qantas Airways Ltd. agreed to sell its catering division to an Emirates Group business to divert cash to areas such as premium lounges and ultra long-haul routes.
About 1,200 Qantas employees will transfer to Dnata, the Australian airline said in a statement Wednesday. Dnata, an aviation-services company, will supply catering for Qantas flights for an initial period of 10 years. The transaction value wasn’t disclosed.
Qantas has sold non-core assets in the past few years including a military aircraft services division as it focused on bolstering earnings through premium customers and direct flights to far-flung destinations. The carrier’s catering division, with facilities in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth, is a capital-intensive operation that requires specialist vehicles to load aircraft and food-preparation sites to be near an airport.
Dnata serves more than 320,000 meals a day, according to its website. The Australian carrier says its catering business produces more than 34 million meals annually for Qantas and other airlines each year, equivalent to about 93,000 a day.
Last month, Qantas began flying between Perth and London, the first non-stop passenger services to connect Australia and Europe. The carrier said it plans to start a Melbourne-San Francisco service in September, and is also considering direct flights to Chicago.
To contact the reporter on this story: Angus Whitley in Sydney at awhitley1@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Anand Krishnamoorthy at anandk@bloomberg.net, Lena Lee
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