Air France and it's French low-cost outlet, Transavia, decided to abandon project "Mimosa", a new budget airline based at Nice Côte d'Azur airport.

Project "Mimosa" was announced by Transavia towards the end of January 2010. The new airline was meant to replace other Air France franchises such as Brit Air and Régional on routes between major French cities.

Lionel Guérin, Transavia's CEO, declared during a press conference: "This year, we have sufficiently grown, we are going towards sustainable development, we do not want to take risks, so we will not do it."

However, according the the French newspaper La Tribune, the real reason behind the decision not to continue with the project was that Air France pilots sabotaged it because of the agreement made in 2006, when Transavia was setting up in France, forbidding the transfer of activities between Air France and Transavia.

This is bad news for the Côte d’Azur region, which finds itself without fast train connection and without budget regional flight connections. However, this is great news for Ryanair and easyJet, which have already set up domestic flights in France:

Ryanair:

• between Marseille and Biarritz, Nantes, Brest, Tours, Beauvais, Lille
• between Beauvais and Pau

• between Paris Orly and Nice, Toulouse
• between Paris Roissy and Nice, Toulouse, Biarritz, Ajaccio, Bastia
• between Lyon and Bastia, Toulouse, Biarritz, Bordeaux, Nantes

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