The operation that was supposed to be the largest corporate transaction of the decade in Canary maritime transport has definitively run aground. The negotiations between Boluda and the investment vehicle Transoceánica Canaria to acquire the inter-island route package of Naviera Armas Trasmediterránea have been concluded unsuccessfully. The failure of this Canarian-Valencian alliance is because Baleària is on track to acquire some Canarian capital with the transportation company founded by the Armas family when the Civil War ended in 1939 and by 1943 they had control of Falange, the political arm of Francoism. This has led to the collapse of the operation of the commercial entity of Transoceánica Canaria, which will change from being chaired by the sole administrator of Lavina in the Canaries to an executive from a gym chain. The company that brought together the elite of the islands — including Rodolfo Núñez Ruano (president and part owner of Binter), Germán C. Suárez (administrator of Astican), and José Julio Artiles (executive and expected successor of Juan Miguel Sanjuan at Satocan) — opted for a drastic simplification toward unipersonality under the control of Avantech Equipos, the firm of Francisco Guerra Álvarez, who manages sports spaces, in theory, because his company, Lude, has been sold to a fund operating under the brand Alfafit. This move, which was initially interpreted as a technical purge to expedite the purchase, has turned out to be a symptom of a retreat in the face of the impossibility of closing a deal that would require a liquid outlay of 100 million euros and the assumption of complex structural debt. Furthermore, the shareholders of Armas have found in Baleària an efficient exit while also securing an industrial partner that does not compromise the exit of capital before the central government. The alliance between Boluda and the pool of Canarian investors has failed to convince the creditors, who seem to prefer to maintain control of the business and seek a piecemeal divestment rather than accept a write-down or an offer that does not meet their expected returns for this fiscal year 2026. The transfer of their headquarters outside the island subsidiary of Lavinia already marks the definitive distance of the core business group from the project. The structure of Avantech Equipos, now solely at the helm of Transoceánica, inherits a company designed for a maritime power assault that, for now, has come to a standstill.
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