Nearly a decade ago,
William Franke,
then the chairman of Spirit Airlines Inc., proposed that Spirit join his investment firm in a deal to buy
The merger, if it is approved by regulators, would create a discount behemoth and cap decades of deal making for the 84-year-old, a period during which Mr. Franke has helped reshape airlines around the world and nudged several toward a new way of doing business.
“I see opportunity here to expand the model dramatically in the United States,” Mr. Franke said in an interview this week.
Mr. Franke, an early investor in Ireland’s
PLC, helped popularize the ultra-low-cost airline model in the U.S. and around the world. His…
