The bids
| Bidder | Bid |
|---|---|
| $10M (winning bid) | |
| Mercor | $7.5M (backup) |
| Another AI data company | $12.5M (competing bid filed Sept 3) |
Source: Stretto/chapter11cases.
What's being sold
- About 100M emails across 80K accounts
- 500M Teams items, 17M OneDrive items, 20.6M SharePoint items
- 175,658 employee records, 3.4M payroll records, 1.09M timecard records
- 5M crew pairings
- Consumer and loyalty data were excluded
Privacy conditions
The court-appointed privacy ombudsman recommended approval with conditions: Tonic.ai de-identifies the email, a certification is filed before each transfer, and the buyer publicly commits not to re-identify, with that commitment flowing to downstream recipients (The Next Web).
Objections
Unions including the flight attendants (AFA-CWA) and pilots (ALPA) objected over re-identification risk. On October 9, 2026, 120+ members of Congress urged excluding employee data (Senate Commerce).
What it means for your business
- Internal company data now has a public price anchor.
- Employee data is the flashpoint. Exclude it. See employee data and AI training.
- Operating companies can license on their own terms, without a bankruptcy court. See what yours is worth.
Frequently asked questions
Who bought Spirit Airlines' data?
Google won the auction with a $10M bid; Mercor was backup at $7.5M; another AI data company filed a $12.5M competing bid. Court approval was pending as of October 13, 2026.
What data was in the Spirit Airlines sale?
About 100M emails, hundreds of millions of Teams and SharePoint items, and employee, payroll and timecard records. Consumer and loyalty data were excluded.