International Consolidated Airlines, or IAG, is a European airline holding company formed principally of the UK’s British Airways, Spain’s Iberia and Ireland’s Aer Lingus. With operational headquarters in London and registered offices in Madrid, it is the world’s sixth largest airline. Its shares are listed on the London and Madrid Stock Exchanges and form part of both the UK’s UK Index 100 Index and Spain’s IBEX 35.

Along with above-mentioned flag carrier airlines, IAG operates a number of divisions. Under the British Airways umbrella there is BA Cityflyer, Comair and Sunair. Under Iberia there is Air Nostrum and Iberia Express. There is also IAG Cargo, Level, Veuling, Norwegian Air shuttle and the Avios loyalty programme.

IAG was created in 2011 following an agreement between UK and Spanish flag carrier British Airways and Iberia. Shareholders of British Airways received 55% of the new merged company’s shares. The merger saw British Airways and Iberia became 100% owned subsidiaries of the newly formed IAG. IAG shares are listed on the London Stock Exchange.

A preliminary merger agreement was signed in November 2009, followed by a full merger agreement in April 2010. The merger completed 2 Jan 2011 and shares began trading 24 January 2011. Since then, expansion has included the 22 December 2011 agreement to acquire British Midland International (BMI) from Lufhansa for the sum of £172m. On 8 November 2012 IAG made a bid to purchase Vueling, a Spanish low-cost airline based in Barcelona.

By 2012 Iberia was suffering huge losses, to such an extent that British Airways profits were wiped out and IAG Chief Executive, Willie Walsh was left to defend the merger. By 2013 Iberia was perilously close to bankruptcy, exasperated by low-cost competition and recession. By this point its losses totalled a billion euros. In a massive turnaround Iberia returned to profitability from 2014.

In January 2015 IAG bid to purchase Aer Lingus for €1.36 billion. Later that year, May 2015, the Irish government agreed that it would sell its Aer Lingus stake to IAG.In March 2017 IAG announced plans for Level, a new, low-cost, long haul airline operating from Barcelona. On 29 December 2017 IAG announced that it had acquired major parts of the defunct Austrian leisure airline Niki with a plan to establish a new Austrian subsidiary of Vueling in its place. IAG shares remain very much in demand, with institutional investors and funds alike.

The group is striving to become the world’s leading airline group on sustainability pledging commitment to ambitious goals around noise and carbon efficiency to be implemented by 2020.