JetBlue further improves proposal to acquire Spirit Airlines, offers US$2 more per share

JetBlue has submitted a decisively superior proposal to the Board of Directors of Spirit Airlines to acquire all of the outstanding common stock of Spirit.

The further improved proposal, which was submitted at the request of Spirit’s Board and following completion of JetBlue’s diligence review and discussions with Spirit’s management team, is an update to JetBlue’s previous proposals (dated March 29, 2022, April 29, 2022, and June 6, 2022, respectively) and is structured to maximise value and certainty for Spirit and its stockholders, with terms including:

Increased price of $33.50 per Spirit share: JetBlue’s proposal continues to offer Spirit stockholders a superior, all-cash premium. The increased price of $33.50 per Spirit share represents an improvement of $2.00 per share or 6.3% compared to JetBlue’s June 6 proposal, and a 67.6% premium to the implied value of the Frontier transaction as of June 17, 2022.
Stronger divestiture commitment: JetBlue’s June 20 proposal includes a significant enhancement to its prior proposals through an obligation to divest assets of JetBlue and Spirit up to a material adverse effect on the combined JetBlue-Spirit, with a limited carve-out to this divestiture obligation for actions that would be reasonably likely to materially and adversely affect the anticipated benefits under JetBlue’s Northeast Alliance. This commitment significantly increases the divestitures JetBlue would be willing to commit to making in order to obtain regulatory approval and meaningfully exceeds the divestiture commitment from Frontier.
“After discussions with the Spirit team last week and further due diligence review, we are more convinced than ever that a JetBlue-Spirit transaction would create a true national competitor to the Big Four and deliver value to all of our stakeholders,” said Robin Hayes, Chief Executive Officer, JetBlue. “Together, we will deliver lower fares and a better experience to more customers.”