A court in the United Kingdom has ordered the liquidation of Global Airlines, the illustrious A380 airline founded in 2021 by travel enthusiast James Asquith, but after 5 years, four flights and tens of millions burned, it’s now game over for this dream.
Global Airlines had acquired an old Airbus A380 and following a new livery and several test flights offered four flights, operated by Hi Fly, in May 2025 that went to New York JFK from both Glasgow & Manchester.
To say Global Airlines ever had any chance of success would be the overstatement of the century but it was an interesting project to follow along as an aviation lover.
While there were many in the media and blogosphere who made fun or expressed outright contempt for the founder James Asquith I was always somewhat indifferent about that, it’s not personal for me and I don’t have to like someone who starts a new company (especially since I don’t know him personally).
The requiring winding-up order has now been published in The Gazette.
(Company Number 13508008)
Registered office: First Floor, 3 St. Michael’s Alley, LONDON, EC3V 9DS
In the High Court Of Justice
No 004213 of 2026
Date of Filing Petition: 29 May 2026
Date of Winding-up Order: 04 November 2026
Official Receiver: V Prime PO BOX 16662, BIRMINGHAM, B2 2HA, Telephone number:0300 678 0016, Email address:London1.OR@insolvency.gov.uk
Capacity of office holder(s): Liquidator
Date of Appointment: 04 November 2026
I don’t think anyone can say that this would be anything but surprising. I haven’t heard anything public from James either for a very long time and his social media that was always very active doesn’t show anything current. The last social media post by Global Airlines was in March.
Global Airlines website is still running but doesn’t have any nothing about the court ordered winding-up process.
In a business environment where even established airlines with a large customer base and existing route networks falter, a new carrier that has only one aircraft and no operator certificate simply isn’t a venture that can take off (all pun intended).
Nevertheless I found this was an interesting project to follow along and see where it went. When they sold tickets for their two flights I had one look and said yeah… not for that price but apparently plenty of people bit and took part of that trip. They even managed to lull in a travel journalist who wrote glowing reviews.
UK-Based Aviation Startup Global Airlines Is Now Selling Tickets Ex Glasgow/Manchester to JFK
Aviation Startup Global Airlines Just Had Their Inaugural Flight From Glasgow to JFK
I still don’t know for sure who bankrolled this adventure and what the original purpose of it was. It for sure wasn’t Asquith because he doesn’t have the pockets for something like this. They had quite a few people on payroll and in “executive” positions. All these test flights must have burned a lot of fuel (and money).
There was talk about some middle eastern investor but who knows. Why would anyone pump tens of millions into such a project which anyone could tell it would have zero chance to succeed as a commercially viable business?
It was all very odd and now it’s game over.
Conclusion
The often-talked-about aviation startup Global Airlines has just received winding up order from a court in the UK, roughly a year and a half after they had HiFly operate the only two round trips for them.
I still think that for reliable operations, you need several planes in the air. Keeping this afloat will cost a fortune, and I’m sure several million have been spent to make HMF380 flights happen. And for the amount of money, energy and enthusiasm spent the final product didn’t seem to be very good.
Now it’s all over and the protagonists of this adventure have all but disappeared from the face of the earth, at least as far as appearances are concerned. This must have paid off for someone in some way but I feel like we’ll never learn the true reason behind starting Global Airlines.