Taking a Look at TACA Airlines

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TACA Airlines
History
TACA Airlines was founded in 1931 by Lowell Yerex. When it first began operations, TACA would fly single-engine Stinson planes. The sole idea of TACAs founder was to establish an airline for each Latin-American country. But despite this idea, only TACA International survived out of all the franchise airlines that were created. In 1945, Yerex left the company and TACA was forced to move its headquarters to El Salvador, where the company was able to modernize and expand. Between the 1940s to the 1990s, TACA bought out a majority of shares of flag carrier airlines of Guatemala, Costa Rica, and Nicaragua, and began operations under the name Grupo TACA. TACA was later organized as an international company, setting its headquarters in San Salvador under the name TACA International Airlines. During the 1940s and 1960s, TACA Airlines began to acquire turboprop airliners such as the DC-3 and the Vickers Viscount to be able to expand its routes around the Americas.
In the 1970s, TACA Airlines entered its jet age when it acquired its first jet, A BAC One Eleven. The One Eleven was used between the 1970s and the early 1980s, then later replaced by the Boeing 737-200. Until 1980, TACA Airlines was owned by a Unites States company and was headquartered in New Orleans, Louisiana under administration of the Kriete Family of El Salvador. During the 1980s, TACA Airlines made several upgrades to its fleet by substituting older turboprops and the One Eleven airliner for more fuel efficient airliners such as the 737-300 and the 737-400. In the 1990s, TACA Airlines became the principal user and launching customer of the Airbus A320 model in Latin America. The Airbus A320 were substitutes for the aging Boeing 737-200/-300/-400 seri...

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...es announced that it would merge its assets with Avianca, a Colombian airline. The agreement was to work as a combined fleet but they will maintain their own trademark and operations. Avianca and TACA Airlines operate a combined fleet of 129 aircraft and serve over 100 destinations in several countries including the Americas and Europe. In December 2009, the Colombian Civil Aeronautical Agency gave approval for the merger.

Future
Grupo TACA has a created an aggressive growth and development strategy that is aimed at ensuring dominant revenue, competitive cost structure, world class product integrity, and programs that are needed to maintain a high morale and productivity. Grupo TACA calls this the ‘Focus Plan’ and is said to be able to generate over $500 million in annual revenues and is expected to generate over $1 billion in annual sales within the next 5 years.

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