Lufthansa Group confirmed on May 12, 2026, it is moving ahead with the acquisition of a majority stake in Italian flag carrier ITA Airways.
The German airline group will exercise an option to buy an additional 49% in ITA Airways from the Italian state for €325 million, bringing the share of the carrier that it controls from 41% to 90%. As per the conditions of its initial investment, Lufthansa can buy the remaining 10% of ITA Airways later.
The deal, which is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2027, subject to approval by the European Commission and the US Department of Justice, has not come as a surprise. The terms of Lufthansa Group’s original investment in ITA Airways already contemplated this possibility, with the German group having already stated that it sought to obtain full control of the Italian carrier.
This way ITA Airways will move closer to the Lufthansa orbit, following the path of other carriers, such as SWISS, Austrian Airlines and Brussels Airlines, which became fully integrated into the Lufthansa Group after being acquired.
On an operational level, ITA Airways has also progressively become more integrated with the other airlines of the Lufthansa Group. On March 31, 2026, ITA Airways formally joined Star Alliance and, in the months prior to that, it dropped its own Volare loyalty program and adopted Lufthansa’s Miles & More. Likewise, earlier in 2026, ITA Airways moved its German operations to Lufthansa’s terminals at the latter’s Frankfurt (FRA) and Munich (MUC) hubs.
In a press release announcing the latest change to the airline’s shareholding structure, Jörg Eberhart, CEO of ITA Airways, said: “Lufthansa’s decision is a clear demonstration of the good work carried out so far.”
AeroTime will be publishing an exclusive interview with ITA Airways CEO, Jörg Eberhart, with its Insights Newsletter on May 20, 2026.
