Some mildly surprising news out today from British Airways, which announced it was buying  French airline L’Avion for about $108 million.

L’Avion is an all business-class trans-Atlantic carrier, a lonely survivor in a niche that not too long ago was populated by Silverjet, EOS, and MaxJet. The airline has been flying Boeing 757s between Paris-Orly and Newark twice a day, Monday through Friday.

The move comes after British Airways recently unrolled its new OpenSkies airline — which began daily flights between Paris and JFK.

British Airways says it is going to combine the airline with its existing OpenSkies operation, which will allow it to fly three daily flights between Paris Orly and the New York market.

On first blush, it would appear that British Airways believes this was a quick and dirty way to grow its operation. It also gives them access to more slots at Orly, which is probably worth more than a few francs.

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