Astar Air Cargo

ASTAR Air Cargo
Founded	1969
Ceased operations	June 1, 2012
Hubs	Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport
Fleet size	8
Destinations	18
Headquarters	Corporate office in Miami, Florida, USA
Key people	John Dasburg is the Chairman and CEO.; Stephen C. Dodd is the Chief Financial Officer
Website	www.astaraircargo.us

ASTAR Air Cargo was an American cargo airline based in Miami, Florida, USA. It operated regularly scheduled cargo charter services to as many as 34 US airports and nine international airports on behalf of DHL, as well as worldwide charter freight services. It provided air freight services to six domestic and foreign locations for the United States Department of Defense. Its main base was Cincinnati Northern Kentucky International Airport in Hebron, Kentucky, with hubs at Miami International Airport and Los Angeles International Airport.^[2]

History

DHL Airways Airbus A300B4F

The airline was established and started operations in 1969. It was formed as DHL Worldwide Express by Adrian Dalsey, Larry Hillblom and Robert Lynn to shuttle bills of lading between Hawaii and San Francisco. It rebranded as DHL Airways in 1983 and grew rapidly, initiating services to the Philippines, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia, creating a new industry of door-to-door express services in the Pacific Basin and later worldwide. Lufthansa and Japan Airlines each acquired a 5% stake, increased to 25% each in 1992. Deutsche Post acquired a 22.5% stake in 1998, gradually increasing it to 100% in 2001–2002.^[2] The airline was spun off from DHL and a majority stake sold to a private investor in order to comply with federal foreign ownership laws. FedEx and UPS challenged the U.S. citizenship of DHL Airways, asserting to the Department of Transportation that DPWN exercised effective operational control of the airline.

In July 2003, a US investment group headed by John Dasburg (now chairman, chief executive and president of the airline), completed a management buy-out of the airline using financing provided by Boeing Capital and subsequently changed the name to ASTAR Air Cargo on June 30, 2003. Its two target customers continue to be DHL Worldwide Express and the United States Air Force. In 2007 DHL Express bought 49.5% of nonvoting and 24.5% of voting stock and added a member to the board of ASTAR Air Cargo.

ASTAR is currently owned by John Dasburg, Richard Blum and Michael Klein.

On May 28, 2008, DHL announced the plan to terminate its business relationship with ASTAR by outsourcing the air transportation to its competitor UPS. In May 2009 DHL terminated their plan to outsource to UPS and ASTAR continued operating out of DHL's CVG facility.

The company decided to shut down its cargo operations when its contract with DHL, its largest customer, was terminated abruptly effective June 1, 2012. All remaining active aircraft were put in storage.