Rex Airlines Pty Ltd is an Australian regional airline based in Mascot, New South Wales. It operates scheduled regional services using turboprop aircraft. Between 2021 and 2024, Rex also operated jet services between selected major Australian cities. In July 2024, it collapsed and was placed into voluntary administration, which it exited in December 2025 after its acquisition by American airline holding company Air T.
It is the primary subsidiary of Regional Express Holdings, itself owned by American airline holding company Air T. Rex is Australia's second-largest regional airline by number of regional destinations, serving 51 regional destinations, behind QantasLink, who serve 55 regional destinations across Australia.A 'regional' airport in Australia is broadly defined as every commercial airport that is not in Adelaide, Brisbane, Cairns, Canberra, Darwin, Gold Coast, Hobart, Melbourne, Perth or Sydney.
On 30 July 2024, the airline ceased all bookings for domestic jet service routes to capital cities and fell into voluntary administration, appointing joint administrators from EY. It came one day after Rex requested a trading halt on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX), amid fears the airline could halt all operations. Rex continues to operate regional services, with the Government of Australia having underwritten its continuing operations.
In September 2024, two months after the commencement of the administration, no buyer was found, with fears the company could be liquidated. It did, however, previously get an extension from the Federal Court of Australia to further facilitate the sale process.
In November 2024, the company received another extension of the administration and received funding from the government to keep it afloat. It also had previously started stripping a few subsidiaries, such as Pel-Air to Toll Group.
In January 2025, the federal government bought $50 million debt from the senior lender PAG in another effort to secure the future of the airline, and supported administrators in again finding a buyer.
In October 2025, administrator EY entered a sale agreement with Air T to purchase the airline. The sale was completed on 18 December 2025.
History
The airline was established in 2002 when the Australiawide Airlines consortium (set up by former Ansett Australia employees) acquired Hazelton Airlines and Kendell Airlines, before merging the companies and starting operations as Rex in August 2002.Flight International 12–18 April 2005 In 2005, Australiawide Airlines was renamed Regional Express Holdings and partially floated on the Australian Securities Exchange. On 30 November 2005, Rex announced the acquisition of the Dubbo-based Air Link, another regional airline.
In October 2007, Rex expanded into Queensland when it commenced operations between Brisbane and Maryborough. This exacerbated an existing problem within the company of not having enough pilots to crew its flights (due to the expansion of larger airlines, especially Jetstar and Virgin Blue), and Rex suspended operations out of Brisbane (and from Sydney to Cooma during the summer "low season" for this route to the NSW ski fields) in November 2007. To provide a medium-term solution to the pilot shortage, Rex announced that it was establishing a cadet-pilot flight-training programme.
In November 2015, Rex announced the resumption of services to the NSW Snowy Mountains in conjunction with Snowy Mountains Airport Corporation, with the flights resuming in March 2016. In December 2015, Rex announced that it would be commencing operations in Western Australia in February the following year after being selected by the Government of Western Australia to be the operator of regulated RPT routes after a tender process. Initially operating from Perth to Albany and Esperance, in July 2018 the Western Australian operations expanded to include Carnarvon and Monkey Mia. It brought Rex's weekly flights to roughly 1,500 across 60 destinations.
Starting on 6 April 2020, Rex significantly scaled back all its regional services due to the COVID-19 pandemic, continuing to only offer government-subsidised services within Queensland and Western Australia and one flight a week between all 54 regional and remote communities within its route network. Services including Adelaide to Port Augusta, Sydney to Newcastle and Sydney to Armidale were suspended.
In June 2020, eyeing the demise of Tigerair Australia, Rex announced interest in expanding into the domestic airline market between Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. Rex leased six Boeing 737-800s previously leased by Virgin Australia to operate the new services, with the first delivered in November 2020. The first jet operations began on 1 March 2021 on the Melbourne to Sydney route. Also in June 2020, Rex announced that it had entered into a memorandum of understanding with ATR to explore options for replacing the Saab 340 fleet with ATR 42 and ATR 72 aircraft. Following the airline's launch of jet services in March 2021, Rex replaced the announced Brisbane jet services in early April with services to Adelaide and Gold Coast, with the start of services occurring between 29 March and 1 April. The airline later cancelled all 737 flights and went into administration.
Competition with Qantas From late 2020 Rex publicly accused Qantas of anti-competitive conduct. After Rex announced plans to operate Boeing 737 services between capital cities, Qantas's regional subsidiary QantasLink began services on several regional routes on which Rex had been the sole operator, and Qantas added capacity on intercity routes that Rex had entered. In March 2021 Rex deputy chairman John Sharp said Qantas had embarked on a "deliberate strategy" of entering Rex's routes in an attempt to "intimidate and damage" the airline, and argued the routes carried too few passengers to sustain two operators. QantasLink chief executive John Gissing dismissed the complaint as a "classic Rex tantrum", saying "Rex's idea of competition is that it's something that happens to other people". Rex announced that it would withdraw from five regional routes—Sydney–Bathurst, Sydney–Cooma, Sydney–Grafton, Sydney–Lismore and Adelaide–Kangaroo Island—but reversed the decision later that month after the Commonwealth extended its regional route subsidies.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) examined Rex's complaints. In its March 2021 airline competition report the ACCC noted that Qantas had announced 26 new routes since the start of the pandemic and that Rex was the sole operator on only eight of them, and said that Rex's own expansion "does not suggest that the entry of Qantas on particular routes is impeding Rex from competing across the broader network" and that "competition appears to be increasing not decreasing". In June 2021 the ACCC said it would consider enforcement action if an airline's capacity or pricing practices had the purpose, effect or likely effect of substantially lessening competition. In August 2024, after Rex entered voluntary administration, the ACCC stated that it had "conducted a thorough investigation" of the concerns Rex raised in late 2020 and early 2021 and had concluded that "a range of factors impacted the competitive dynamics in the market at the time, particularly the COVID-19 movement restrictions and border closures".
The same report identified constraints on Rex's intercity expansion, including aircraft and pilot shortages, difficulty securing fleet financing, and Sydney Airport slot arrangements under which Rex's regional operations meant it "already held too many slots at the airport to be considered a 'new entrant'". Following Rex's withdrawal from capital-city routes, the ACCC reported that airfares on major city routes rose by 13.3per cent to September 2024, and that by March 2025 the Qantas Group and Virgin Australia together carried 98.3per cent of domestic passengers.
Regional Express Holdings
Regional Express Holdings is the parent company of a number of airline and associated companies in Australia. It is based in Mascot, New South Wales (a suburb of Sydney) and is a public listed company on the Australian Securities Exchange. Regional Express Holdings arose from the 2001 collapse of Ansett Airlines, which was the parent company of Kendell Airlines and Hazelton Airlines. A group of Singaporean investors and a collection of Australian private investors purchased the Hazelton and Kendell businesses, which were profitable entities before they were taken over by Ansett. The investors formed Australiawide Airlines, which was officially incorporated on 12 February 2002. The assets of the two airlines were purchased by Australiawide and merged to form the airline Regional Express, known as Rex. In 2005 Australiawide offered a percentage of the owners' shares (35 million out of 115 million shares, or 30.43%) to the public in a float.Rex Initial Public Offering Media Release retrieved 26 September 2007.Rex Share Offer Media Release retrieved 26 September 2007. At the same time an agreement was reached with the owners of Pel-Air that Australiawide would purchase Pel-Air.Rex Invests in Pel-Air Media Release retrieved 26 September 2007.
As part of the public float process, Australiawide Airlines' name was changed to Regional Express Holdings. Regional Express Holdings is the owner of a number of other companies.Regional Express Holdings Corporate structure retrieved 12 May 2020. The main asset is Regional Express Pty Ltd. which is the company that operates the business of the airline Regional Express (Rex) and owns Rex Airlines Pty Ltd. Rex Airlines Pty Ltd was registered on the 6 July 2020 as part of Rex domestic expansion plans, responsible for issuing tickets on behalf of Regional Express Pty Limited. Another company is Air Partners Pty Ltd, which is the company that owns National Jet Express and Pel-Air and Rex Flyer. The third subsidiary company is Rex Investment Holdings Pty Ltd, which owns the Australian Aero Propeller Maintenance and Australian Airline Pilot Academies based in Wagga Wagga and Ballarat.
2024 voluntary administration
In July 2024, the company requested a trading halt. This sparked comparisons with Bonza, that had collapsed and later was wound up earlier that year, and calls by the Transport Workers' Union of Australia for government intervention, with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese asking for time and conditions and criticising the company's move away from regional service. It later suspended ticket sales with plans to exit out of the capital city market and appointed EY as administrators. Capital city flights were suspended, with an agreement reached with Virgin Australia to accommodate affected Rex customers between 30 July and 14 August 2024. On 31 July, the company was placed into voluntary administration and cancelled all capital cities flights, but continued to operate regional services. PAG has held off taking the company under receivership, with the hope that the company will be sold instead. The leases on three of its Boeing 737s were taken over by Virgin Australia.Virgin swoops for Rex 737s in remarkable turnaround Australian Aviation 30 July 2024