Turkey’s fast-growing low-cost carrier Pegasus Airlines announced on 8 December that it has signed a binding €154 million share-purchase agreement to acquire 100 % of Czech Airlines (ČSA) and leisure carrier Smartwings from Prague City Air. The price includes the assumption of all outstanding debt and is subject to antitrust and foreign-ownership approvals in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, Hungary and the EU.
ČSA is Europe’s fifth-oldest carrier but has struggled for years with a limited network and the fallout from Covid-19. Smartwings, by contrast, has rebuilt aggressively and now operates 47 Boeing 737s on charter, ACMI and scheduled routes to 80 destinations. Combining the two airlines gives Pegasus—currently flying to 158 cities in 55 countries—a ready-made Central-European hub at Prague Václav Havel Airport and valuable European Union traffic rights that are hard for non-EU carriers to secure from scratch.
![Pegasus Strikes €154 Million Deal To Acquire Czech Airlines & Smartwings]()
Executives in Istanbul said the acquisition will be folded into Pegasus’s existing pan-European expansion strategy, which targets secondary hubs with strong outbound tourism demand. Pegasus will retain Smartwings’ air-operator certificates in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Hungary and will leverage its own lower unit costs and Airbus A321neo order-book to up-gauge high-demand routes.
For Czech corporates and inbound investors, the deal could mean denser connections to the Middle East, Central Asia and East Africa via Pegasus’s Istanbul mega-hub, reinforcing Prague’s attractiveness as a regional HQ location. At the same time, labour unions have called for consultations to protect seniority lists and Prague-based maintenance jobs once fleet harmonisation begins.
Regulators are expected to vet ownership and control structures carefully; Czech law limits majority non-EU ownership of carriers holding EU traffic rights. Pegasus says closing is likely in mid-2026, giving HR and mobility managers several seasons to review corporate travel contracts and negotiated fares.
ČSA is Europe’s fifth-oldest carrier but has struggled for years with a limited network and the fallout from Covid-19. Smartwings, by contrast, has rebuilt aggressively and now operates 47 Boeing 737s on charter, ACMI and scheduled routes to 80 destinations. Combining the two airlines gives Pegasus—currently flying to 158 cities in 55 countries—a ready-made Central-European hub at Prague Václav Havel Airport and valuable European Union traffic rights that are hard for non-EU carriers to secure from scratch.
Executives in Istanbul said the acquisition will be folded into Pegasus’s existing pan-European expansion strategy, which targets secondary hubs with strong outbound tourism demand. Pegasus will retain Smartwings’ air-operator certificates in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Hungary and will leverage its own lower unit costs and Airbus A321neo order-book to up-gauge high-demand routes.
For Czech corporates and inbound investors, the deal could mean denser connections to the Middle East, Central Asia and East Africa via Pegasus’s Istanbul mega-hub, reinforcing Prague’s attractiveness as a regional HQ location. At the same time, labour unions have called for consultations to protect seniority lists and Prague-based maintenance jobs once fleet harmonisation begins.
Regulators are expected to vet ownership and control structures carefully; Czech law limits majority non-EU ownership of carriers holding EU traffic rights. Pegasus says closing is likely in mid-2026, giving HR and mobility managers several seasons to review corporate travel contracts and negotiated fares.
