ITA Airways Still Looking at Newark as Sharon Stone Campaign Heads to US

ROME — ITA Airways (AZ) is still studying flights to Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR), CEO Joerg Eberhart said on September 14, at the launch of a global brand campaign fronted by actress Sharon Stone that the airline plans to take to the United States this month.

"We are looking into Newark," Eberhart said during a virtual press conference for journalists, attended by Airways. He said ITA's New York flights so far use John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) and that the airline "might fly to Newark in the future," but he gave no timeline, aircraft or schedule. He said ITA had other ideas for the US without specifying them.

Eberhart was answering a question from Leonard Berberi of Corriere della Sera about the transatlantic market. He called the US the airline's most important market outside Italy.

Simply Italian Campaign

The campaign, Simply Italian, went on air in Italy on September 14. According to ITA's announcement, as carried by the PPN ADI news agency, it is due to debut in the United States and Brazil on September 22 through an integrated multichannel media plan. ITA developed it with POPE Creative Studio as a series of short, standalone spots, each built around a single scene, which Eberhart described as snapshots of life on board.

Eberhart said the aim in the US and Brazil is to strengthen ITA's visibility and relevance. Stone, the airline's new global ambassador, will accompany the launch in Italy and in ITA's main foreign markets, according to the announcement.

Newark and the Joint Venture

Newark is not a new idea for ITA. In an October 2025 interview with Airways, Eberhart said adding Newark to complement JFK "makes sense" once ITA is approved to join the transatlantic joint venture of Lufthansa (LH), United Airlines (UA) and Air Canada (AC), and that such discussions "must wait for regulatory clearance." Newark is a United hub.

The joint venture goes further than the ties ITA already has with United. ITA lists United among its codeshare partners, and the two have been Star Alliance partners since ITA joined the alliance on April 1 as its 26th member. Joint-venture partners with antitrust immunity can coordinate pricing, capacity and revenue sharing across the North Atlantic, and the three carriers applied to US regulators last year to add ITA.

On May 12, Lufthansa Group CEO Carsten Spohr said ITA's customer-facing systems were integrated with the group's except on North Atlantic flights, "where, as is well known, regulatory approval for our merger is still pending." The Lufthansa release does not say which approval he meant. Lufthansa said the same day that it would exercise an option in June to raise its stake in ITA from 41% to 90%, subject primarily to European Commission and US Department of Justice approval, with completion expected in the first quarter of 2027. Airways covered the planned stake increase in May.

ITA has pointed to the missing partnership in its financial results. Its 2025 results release listed "the absence of commercial support from a partner carrier on routes between Italy and the United States" among the factors that made 2025 a complex year, describing the US as "the Company's primary international market." ITA reported a net result of €209m, its first positive net result, helped by currency accounting adjustments. Operating profit was €25m, and the airline said high fleet lease costs meant its operating result was "not yet fully sustainable."

The Current US Network

ITA's network page lists eight US destinations: Boston, Chicago (May to October 2026), Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, San Francisco and Washington. It also serves Toronto from April to October 2026.

ITA added Houston this year. The first flight between George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) and Rome Fiumicino (FCO) arrived on May 1, and at launch Houston Airports said the route would grow from three to five weekly flights on June 1, using the Airbus A330-900.

Speaking about the US more broadly on September 14, Eberhart said ITA's links between the two countries carry both "incoming tourism to Italy" and "outgoing business for the Italians." Asked about Star Alliance, he said membership lets passengers change flights more easily during irregular operations and gives them access to common terminals.