United Airlines (UA, Chicago O'Hare) along with its fellow immunised Star Alliance partners known as the Star carriers - Air Canada, Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines, LOT Polish Airlines, Lufthansa, SAS Scandinavian Airlines, Swiss, and TAP Air Portugal - have requested the termination of the New York to Lisbon carve-out from the US Department of Transportation (DOT).
On July 10 2009, the DOT approved the Star Alliance application for antitrust immunity but with special conditions attached including the specific route carve-outs. A "carve-out" is when certain cities are exempted from antitrust immunity to preserve competition. Among the markets not granted immunity in July 2009 were New York-Copenhagen Kastrup, New York-Lisbon, New York-Geneva, New York-Stockholm, Cleveland Hopkins-Toronto, Houston-Calgary, Houston-Toronto, New York-Ottawa International and the US to Beijing.
Lodged with the authority on December 11, the carriers illustrated that a carve-out is no longer applicable "when another airline enters the route with at least five nonstop roundtrip flights per week for nine consecutive months." The submission highlights the fact that Delta Air Lines (DL, Atlanta Hartsfield Jackson) has been operating in the New York to Lisbon market since at least March 4, 2019, and has operated more than five weekly flights over that time. According to the ch-aviation schedules module, the Skyteam carrier presently flies 5x weekly between New York JFK and Lisbon with a B767-300(ER). TAP Air Portugal also offers the 2,925 nautical-mile (5,418-kilometre) sector on a daily basis.
Typically the limitations on immunity in the subject market in which the new entry has occurred are automatically withdrawn 60 days from the date of the notification, so the airlines are calling for this to happen by February 11, 2020. The carriers have requested that the DOT confirms that, as of the February date, the New York-Lisbon carve out is no longer in effect or binding on those nine airlines.
