Bye TAME. The Ecuadorian Government put its assets up for sale
By AviationNews
02/03/2021
In the Americas there are fewer and fewer 100% state airlines: just Cubana de Aviación, Conviasa, Boliviana de Aviación, the small Bahamaair and Cayman Airways and Aerolineas Argentinas. Until a few months ago, TAME (Transportes Aéreos Militares Ecuatorianos) also played in that league, an airline that was born in December 1962 as a development company, in the style of LADE in Argentina, which operated as a national and international commercial airline and that in May of 2020, due to mismanagement, it was declared part of the process of liquidation by President Lenín Moreno. Now the airline has just formally started a call to sell – together or separately – its assets.
“The invitation – said the representative in charge of liquidating the company – is aimed at all those physical and legal actors with the capacity to acquire assets, whether public or private, national or foreign who wish to participate in this international public tender.”
On the other hand, Minister Roberto Cordova Bernal clarified that the sale of assets will not include packages but that they may be disposed of individually according to the interest of the bidders. The call includes assets such as buildings, a hangar and seven aircraft: 3 ATR 42-500, 2 Embraer ERJ 190 and 2 Kodiak 100 (mono turboprop).
TAME was born in 1962 as a military airline to facilitate the transport of passengers and cargo to the main cities of the country and articulate territories that had difficult access by land. Its first domestic operations were with C-47 aircraft and later DC-3 and DC-6, on the Quito-Guayaquil routes.
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, TAME added three Boeing 727-100 to its fleet and then four Boeing 727-200 and three Fokker F28 Fellowship series 2000 and 4000.
With the new millennium, the company takes a great leap forward by renting three A320s and one A319 for five years, which operate only on the Quito, Guayaquil and Galapagos route. With the arrival of the Airbus, the gradual process of retirement of the Boeing 727-100 and 200 began.
In 2006 – coinciding with the disappearance of Ecuatoriana – it bought two Embraer ERJ-170s and three Embraer ERJ-190s, so it already had 9 aircraft. In 2010 the company began to develop on international routes flying from Quito to Bogotá, Caracas, Lima, Panama, Buenos Aires and Havana, while incorporating three ATR42-500, to also connect some isolated regions of the country and help feed the main national airports, Quito and Guayaquil. In 2013, TAME incorporated its first Airbus A330 to cover the Guayaquil-New York and Quito-New York route and later Quito-Fort Lauderdale and Guayaquil – Fort Lauderdale, and purchased 3 Quest Kodiak for the routes in the country’s Amazon.
But in September 2019, after a review of the aircraft leasing contracts by the Comptroller, it was known that TAME lost USD 16.2 million between September 2015 and December 2018, due to mismanagement, not complying with technical aspects. and cheap on some leases. Converted as of 2011 into a political instrument, already as a Public Company, in 2020 the Executive Power requested its liquidation. Now comes the airline’s disappearance with the sale of its assets.
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