Airlines selling Worldspan to investment group ATLANTA (AP) =97 Delta, Northwest and American airlines are selling their=20 jointly owned ticket processor, Worldspan Inc., to a private investment=20 group. Terms of the sale to Travel Transaction Processing Corp., announced= =20 Tuesday, were not disclosed. Travel Transaction Processing is a new company= =20 formed by Citigroup Venture Capital Equity Partners L.P. and Toronto-based= =20 Teachers' Merchant Bank. Worldspan is a travel reservation service owned=20 jointly by Delta, Northwest and American parent AMR. It has 3,200=20 employees. Delta owns 40% of Atlanta-based Worldspan, while Northwest has=20 34 percent and AMR 26 percent. The sale comes as all three airlines are=20 struggling to boost income and slash costs, and American has said=20 bankruptcy remains a possibility if it does not soon improve its financial= =20 condition. Delta views Worldspan's sale as a boost to cash flow, spokeswoman Peggy=20 Estes said. The airline reported a nearly $1.3 billion loss in 2002. "It's= =20 basically we're working toward a strong balance sheet and this will add a=20 little more cash to our balance sheet," Estes said. The deal is subject to= =20 financing, government and regulatory approvals. The companies expect the=20 sale to close in mid-2003. Worldspan will remain based in Atlanta,=20 spokeswoman Patricia Cooledge said. Besides selling its services to various airlines and travel agencies,=20 Worldspan handles ticketing for online companies, including Priceline.com=20 and Expedia. In January, Worldspan signed a five-year, $350 million deal to= =20 buy IBM equipment to update its system. *************************************************** The owner of Roger's Trinbago Site/TnTisland.com Roj (Roger James) escape email mailto:ejames@escape.ca Trinbago site: www.tntisland.com Carib Brass Ctn site www.tntisland.com/caribbeanbrassconnection/ Steel Expressions www.mts.net/~ejames/se/ Site of the Week: http://www.dbombo.net/muddyangels/ TnT Webdirectory: http://search.co.tt *********************************************************