It owns the brand Varig although the name Varig refers to the informally known "new" Varig, founded in 2006 and not to the "old" Varig, founded in 1927.
According to the National Civil Aviation Agency of Brazil (ANAC) in September 2011 Gol/Varig had 38.87% of the domestic and 10.00% of the international market shares in terms of passenger kilometres flown.
Gol operates a growing domestic and international scheduled network. Its main hubs are São Paulo's Congonhas Airport, Rio de Janeiro's Galeão International Airport and Brasília International Airport - Presidente Juscelino Kubitschek. Gol also has focus operations at Belo Horizonte Int'l Airport, Rio de Janeiro's Santos Dumont Airport, São Paulo's Guarulhos International Airport and Porto Alegre's Salgado Filho International Airport.
Gol refers to itself as Gol Intelligent Airlines (Gol Linhas aéreas inteligentes in Portuguese) as a slogan. The company is traded on the New York Stock Exchange as "GOL Linhas Aéreas Inteligentes S.A."Gol" in Portuguese and Spanish translates into English: goal.
History
The airline was established in 2000 and started operations on January 15, 2001. It is a subsidiary of the Brazilian conglomerate Grupo Áurea based at Minas Gerais state, which has other transport interests including Brazil's largest long-distance bus company. Grupo Áurea in turn is owned by the Constantino family. As of 2004, Gol had carried 11,600,000 passengers, and constituted 20% of the Brazilian air travel market.
On June 24, 2004 Gol launched simultaneous initial public offerings on the New York and São Paulo stock exchanges. It is now owned by AeroPar Participações (77%), Venture (17.6%) and American International Group (5.4%) and employs 5,456 staff (at March 2007). The growth in Gol's stock price made the Constantino family a member of the Forbes Magazine billionaire list in 2005 .
In 2007, Gol was supposed to begin a code-share agreement with TAP Portugal, opening the European market to the Brazilian airline, and the internal Brazilian market to the Portuguese airline (the largest foreign airline in Brazil). TAP Portugal instead chose to cooperate with TAM Airlines (TAM Linhas Aéreas).
On March 28, 2007 Gol officially purchased part of the assets of VARIG - VRG Linhas Aéreas, informally known as "new Varig", a new airline that owned the brand Varig, for US$320 million from Volo Group and MatlinPatterson Global Opportunies hedge fund. At that time "old Varig" was under bankruptcy protection.
Gol announced that the brand VARIG would continue doing business and operating as Varig rather than its official name VRG Linhas Aéreas. The transaction, via its GTI subsidiary, required a US$98 million cash payment, with the balance through the allocation of non-voting shares to VARIG Logística and Volo which had acquired VARIG in June 2006 for US$24 million. The transaction did not involve the original airline, informally known as "old Varig", which continued to exist until its own bankruptcy mid-2010 under the name Flex Linhas Aéreas.
In 2009 Gol was merged into VRG Linhas Aéreas. VRG Linhas Aéreas thus became an airline that operates two brands: Gol and Varig, although in reality flights are operated only under Gol flight numbers. The brand Varig operates to medium-haul scheduled and charter international destinations within South America and to the Caribbean with Boeing 737-700's configured in two classes, and to long-haul charter international destinations in North America, Europe and Africa with Boeing 767-300ER's configured in economy only. The latter is also used in wet-lease operations. The brand Gol operates most of the flights of the network, and has aircraft configured in all-economy class, used for scheduled domestic and international operations within South America.
Because of contractual obligations between 2006 and 2009 "new Varig" (VRG Linhas Aéreas) was obliged to purchase a minimum of 140 hours/month of services from "old Varig" (Flex Linhas Aéreas). Therefore, some of VRG Linhas Aéreas flights operated with Gol flight numbers are actually flown with chartered aircraft from Flex Linhas Aéreas. The agreement ceased before the bankruptcy of Flex on August 20, 2010.
On February 24, 2010 Gol announced to be in "advanced talks" to join the oneworld alliance, which would allow it to catch up with rival TAM, a recent member of Star Alliance. However, on October 6, 2010, the airline announced a change in position by denying any interest in joining an alliance, preferring to remain independent and to establish a "patchwork of code-sharing agreements."
A Gol Boeing 737-700
On March 18, 2010 Gol unveiled the expansion of its maintenance base located at Belo Horizonte/Confins - Tancredo Neves International Airport. Originally opened in 2008 with the capacity to serve 60 aircraft per year (mainly Boeings 737 and 767), the expansion allowed Gol to increase the number to 120. Gol now seeks homologation from the Federal Aviation Administration, which will enable the center to serve aircraft of other airlines.
Since December 23, 2010 Gol Airlines has an operational partnership with Passaredo Linhas Aéreas.
On July 8, 2011, VRG Linhas Aéreas, owner of the brands Gol and Varig, announced the intention to purchase full control of WebJet Linhas Aéreas. The purchase contract was signed on August 2, 2011. Until approval by all government bodies, both companies will operate independently but eventually Webjet will be integrated into Gol and cease to exist.
Airline Affinity Program
Gol Airlines has an affinity program called Smiles. On a study conducted in 2010, Smiles ranked first among 24 chosen frequent flyer programs, with 100% success of requests made.
Accidents and incidents
29 September 2006: Flight 1907 operated by the Boeing 737-800 SFP registration PR-GTD disappeared from radar while flying over the center-western state of Mato Grosso en route from Manaus to Brasília and Rio de Janeiro-Galeão. The aircraft collided in mid-air with an Embraer Legacy 600 business jet, near the town of Matupá, 470 miles (760 km) south of Manaus. The Gol aircraft crashed in the Amazon jungle leaving no survivors among its 154 occupants and its wreckage was found a day later. The Legacy jet landed safely at Cachimbo Airport, part of the military complex Campo de Provas Brigadeiro Velloso of the Brazilian Air Force with damage to the tail and left winglet.
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