Lufthansa (LH, Frankfurt International) chief executive Christoph Franz says that his group could consider making a bid for SAS Scandinavian Airlines (SK, Copenhagen Kastrup) given the "impressive job" CEO Rickard Gustafson has done at the company. Speaking to Swedish daily, Svenska Dagbladet, Mr Franz said: "It means that we could perhaps consider once again whether an acquisition could be possible." While the German carrier has long been seen as the strongest contender to acquire the struggling Scandinavian carrier, no formal announcement regarding any talks with SAS' primary shareholders, Sweden, Denmark and Norway, has been made. "A Lufthansa purchase of SAS is something that has been discussed back and forth for many years... A few years ago a deal was nearly made but it fell apart, partly due to SAS's bad finances," Mr Franz said. On June 1, SAS and Lufthansa ended a longstanding joint venture but still continue to offer extensive codeshare flights.