In 2009, a professional group of airline managers acquired the intellectual property of Eastern Air Lines to develop a new business plan and financing plan to re-launch the airline.
The team put together a plan to re-launch Eastern to be based at Miami International Airport ("MIA"). It quickly established working relationships with strategic partners including the Miami Airport Authority, Amadeus and Boeing.
Eastern’s relationship with Amadeus dates back to Eastern’s reservation system, called System One. This system was eventually sold by Eastern and later became the core of the Amadeus system. Eastern also has a special and unique relationship with Boeing dating to the 1930s- Eastern was the first to operate the Boeing 727 and the 757.
The team developed a multi-level business and financing plan that is being used to raise the capital required for Eastern to certify under FAA Regulation Part 121. That work has commenced, led by one of the industry’s leading certification consultants, Locked On. Today, the new Eastern is working with various industry-leading aircraft leasing companies to assemble a fleet of 737- Next Generation.
In addition, Eastern has moved into its headquarters office space at Building 5A at MIA, which was the former Eastern Operations Center, a four story building at the corner of LeJeune and 36th Street, and which once housed all of Eastern’s system control and maintenance control centers, and other operating units.
Eastern expects to commence its filings with the DOT and subsequently start its Part 121 FAA certification in early 2014.