The board of Italian flag carrier Alitalia voted on Friday to accept Etihad’s offer of investment in the airline, and stated it would move quickly to finalise the deal.
Alitalia CEO Gabriele Del Torchio said: “Today the Etihad plan was approved, and the board delegated myself and the chairman to study and rapidly come up with a draft of the final contract.”
Etihad is said to be prepared to invest up to €1.25bn in Alitalia over the next four years.
Del Torchio also said that Alitalia is still in negotiation with banks over the restructuring of €700 million of debts.
“We’re proceeding, but you must understand that the sums are not small. We’re still working on it,” he said.