Garuda to merge with other Indonesian tourism businesses
The Indonesian government is mulling a plan to merge Garuda Indonesia with other state-run tourism related companies to cut costs.
It would see the integration of nine state-owned tourism companies including Garuda and low cost arm Citilink.
The merger would include Indonesia’s two airport operators Angkasa Pura, I and II, hotels, and the operations of priority tourism destinations Mandalika in Lombok, Labuan Bajo in Flores and the Borobudur temple and tourism complex in Java.
It would set up a holding company to manage the new entity.
A new holding company would be beneficial to restructuring Garuda’s debt pile, as it owes about $76 million to the airport operators.
Garuda had a first half net loss of $723.26 million.
Talks on a merger have been ongoing for some time and are backed by the President.
"The headwinds in the travel industry provide a good opportunity to start integrating and transforming the tourism and aviation sectors," President Joko Widodo recently said.
Written by Ray Montgomery, Asia Editor
TravelMole Editorial Team
Editor for TravelMole North America and Asia pacific regions. Ray is a highly experienced (15+ years) skilled journalist and editor predominantly in travel, hospitality and lifestyle working with a huge number of major market-leading brands. He has also cover in-depth news, interviews and features in general business, finance, tech and geopolitical issues for a select few major news outlets and publishers.
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