Imperial Airways
Imperial Airways Speedbird logo, mainly used in advertising and rarely on aircraft before 1939.
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| Private | |
| Industry | Air transport |
| Fate | Merged with British Airways Ltd |
| Predecessor | |
| Successor | British Airways Ltd |
| Founded | 31 March 1924 |
| Defunct | 24 November 1939 |
| Headquarters | Croydon, UK |
Imperial Airways was the early British commercial long-range air transport company, operating from 1924 to 1939 and serving parts of Europe but principally the British Empire routes to South Africa, India and the Far East, including Malaya and Hong Kong. There were local partnership companies; Qantas (Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services Ltd) in Australia and TEAL (Tasman Empire Airways Ltd) in New Zealand.
Imperial Airways was merged into the British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) in 1939, which in turn merged with the British European Airways Corporation in 1974 to form British Airways.
The establishment of Imperial Airways occurred in the context of facilitating overseas settlement by making travel to and from the colonies quicker, and that flight would also speed up colonial government and trade that was until then dependent upon ships. The launch of the airline followed a burst of air route surveying in the British Empire after the First World War, and after some experimental (and often dangerous) long-distance flying to the margins of Empire.
Imperial Airways was created against a background of stiff competition from French and German airlines that enjoyed heavy government subsidies and following the advice of the government's Hambling Committee (formally known as the C.A.T Subsidies Committee) under Sir Herbert Hambling. The committee, set up on 2 January 1923, produced a report on 15 February 1923 recommending that four of the largest existing airlines, The Instone Air Line Company, owned by shipping magnate Samuel Instone, Noel Pemberton Billing's British Marine Air Navigation (part of the Supermarine flying-boat company), the Daimler Airway, under the management of George Edward Woods and Handley Page Transport Co Ltd., should be merged. It was hoped that this would create a company which could compete against French and German competition and would be strong enough to develop Britain's external air services while minimizing government subsidies for duplicated services. With this in view, a £1m subsidy over ten years was offered to encourage the merger. Agreement was made between the President of the Air Council and the British, Foreign and Colonial Corporation on 3 December 1923 for the company, under the title of the 'Imperial Air Transport Company' to acquire existing air transport services in the UK. The agreement set out the government subsidies for the new company: £137,000 in the first year diminishing to £32,000 in the tenth year as well as minimum mileages to be achieved and penalties if these weren't met.
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