Oneworld confirmed yesterday that Royal Jordanian, Japan Airlines and Malev Hungarian Airlines will join the alliance as full members on April 1. Five additional subsidiaries of JAL Group will join the same day as affiliates: JALways, Japan Asia Airways, JAL Express, J-AIR and Japan Transocean Air. At the same time, Aer Lingus will withdraw from the alliance ( ATWOnline, May 31, 2006). Three other airlines are lining up to join as affiliates in 2007: Dragonair, LAN Argentina and LAN Ecuador.
LAN Airlines is providing $17.1 million in financing to VRG Linhas Aereas, the "new" Varig. The loans may be converted into shares of the new airline, LAN said, which would make it a minority owner.
Airline efforts to get business and general aviation to bear a larger share of the cost of the air traffic control system may stall when Congress takes up FAA reauthorization legislation this year, a senior congressional staff member said yesterday.
Alaska Airlines said it introduced two 737-400 combis into its fleet for service within Alaska. The conversions were done by Pemco World Air Services. Two more 737-400Cs will enter the fleet by year end. The aircraft, the first 737-400 combis, accommodate 72 passengers and four cargo pallets on the main deck.
European Commission's proposal to include non-EU airlines in its Emissions Trading Scheme is "unlawful and unworkable," US State Dept. Deputy Assistant Secretary for Transportation Affairs John Byerly said at Thursday's American Bar Assn. forum in Washington.
Esterline Corp. reached agreement yesterday to acquire Canada's CMC Electronics for approximately $335 million. The Bellevue, Wash.-based company said the all-cash transaction "significantly expands the scale" of its existing avionics and controls business. Privately held CMC recently was selected by Embraer to provide an electronic flight bag for the Brazilian manufacturer's line of regional jets. In addition to EFBs it supplies a range of electronics products for aviation including antenna systems, head-up displays, enhanced vision systems and flight management systems.
AirTran Holdings said yesterday that it has extended the deadline on its exchange offer for shares in Midwest Air Group to March 8 from Feb. 8 "so that Midwest's shareholders can receive all the information they need." AirTran filed suit in the New York Supreme Court last week to force Midwest to release shareholder names ( ATWOnline, Jan.
Naysa of the Canary Islands ordered two additional ATR 72-500s worth $36 million, adding to the four ordered in September. They will be delivered this year. Naysa currently operates Beech 1900s.
THE FINAL DAYS OF 2006 SHOULD HAVE BEEN A time of quiet celebration and reflection for the employees and management of Midwest Airlines and its Skyway regional affiliate. After five years of red ink culminating in a loss of $64.9 million in 2005, the company at last appeared to be on the road to recovery, posting breakeven earnings of $1.7 million for the third quarter ended Sept. 30, much improved over a deficit of $26.9 million in third quarter of 2005.
Former Continental Airlines Chairman and CEO Gordon Bethune used to say that when it came to managing a business, what you chose to measure and what you rewarded were what you got. An airline that prized punctuality and incentivized its employees to close the cabin doors on schedule would become an ontime airline. But, he pointed out, this cut both ways. An airline that measured and rewarded penny-pinching over customer service would become the equivalent of a pizzeria that made a pie so cheaply that "no one would eat it."
Airline of the Year ANA As the new millennium dawned, the outlook for ANA was not promising. First came the impact of 9/11, followed shortly thereafter by the announcement that major domestic rival Japan Air System would be acquired by the country's leading international airline, Japan Airlines. The latter event meant that ANA would lose its position as the country's dominant domestic carrier, while JAL would gain the domestic network strength it had always lacked to complement one of the world's largest international networks.
Royal Jordanian As the new millennium was approaching, the government of the Kingdom of Jordan undertook a deep analysis of its national carrier, which had failed to produce profits for many years and had amassed a debt of nearly $700 million. The result was unequivocal, and a first in a region where governments are investing vast amounts of money in their carriers to fly the flag: Privatization.
The report, commissioned by Amadeus and developed by Henley Centre HeadlightVision, a London-based strategic futures and marketing consultancy, describes four "traveler tribes" as they might behave in 2020:
ANA As the new millennium dawned, the outlook for ANA was not promising. First came the impact of 9/11, followed shortly thereafter by the announcement that major domestic rival Japan Air System would be acquired by the country's leading international airline, Japan Airlines. The latter event meant that ANA would lose its position as the country's dominant domestic carrier, while JAL would gain the domestic network strength it had always lacked to complement one of the world's largest international networks.
The European Commission asked for public comment on whether the Code of Conduct for Computerized Reservation Systems, first established in 1989, should be revised or abolished. The EC noted that since the last change to the Code of Conduct, most airlines have divested their holdings in GDSs. Of the four major GDS companies, only Amadeus still has some airline ownership: Air France/KLM owns 23.2%, and Lufthansa and Iberia each own 11.6%.
REMEMBER THAT SIGNATURE scene from "The High and the Mighty," the one where they're tossing all manner of objects out the aft of a DC-4 struggling to make San Francisco? With fuel more than a fourth of operating expenses, the airline industry is a lot like that these days. Carriers are cutting weight like crazy and overhauling operationssometimes radicallyin an effort to preserve precious kerosene. For example, British Airways found it carried far too many complaint forms onboard. "They were rarely used," says Doug Brown, chief pilot-technical. So overboard they went, most of them anyhow.
The European Commission's long-anticipated proposal to include aviation in the second phase of the European Emissions Trading Scheme with effect from 2011 already is drawing fire from proponents and critics alike, a situation that makes it unlikely the air will clear anytime soon.
American Airlines & the TWU The first decade of the 21st century has not been kind to airline workers, particularly those employed at US carriers. In response to the dramatic changes in the competitive environment since January 2001, these airlines have eliminated more than 150,000 jobs and reduced salaries and benefits for many who remain.
PRATT & WHITNEY'S PROGRAM to develop replacement parts for the CFM56-3 "is on track," with FAA certification and availability of the first material expected in the first half of 2007, according to Matthew Bromberg, VP and GM of Global Material Solutions, the business unit established to create an alternate parts source for the world's most popular engine.
Aviation Partners Boeing Blended Winglets The design of any transport aircraft reflects a number of engineering compromises and tradeoffs intended to achieve the optimal blend of takeoff and cruise performance, operating economics, reliability and maintainability. An additional half-a-percentage-point improvement in any of those areas may mean the difference between a winning platform and an also-ran. That's what makes Aviation Partners Boeing Blended Winglets such a towering accomplishment.
Emirates SkyCargo At the start of the decade, Emirates SkyCargo was an impressive player in the Middle East air cargo market but only a modest operator on an international scale. However, there can be little doubt after its performance in its 2005-06 fiscal year, in which for the first time in its history it carried more than 1 million tonnes of cargo and generated more than $1 billion in revenue, that it now is a rising power among the global elite of airfreight players.
THE SCENE PROBABLY IS REPEATED around the globe every day. An airline industry professional gets a phone call or e-mail or text message from a friend or relative who is about to take a flight but, having seen yet another air disaster profiled on television, is getting jittery. Once convinced it is safe to fly, the next question is: "How come the ticket costs so much?" Meanwhile the airline professional ponders why the safest, cheapest and one of the cleanest forms of travel has such a lousy image.
Air Canada The wave of restructurings among legacy carriers over the past five years has focused mainly on aligning the financial and operating cost structure with the altered revenue environment. Although this has opened doors to new market opportunities, it has done little to persuade customers that airlines deliver value for money. Fare changes have tended to be seen as reactive, a reluctant response to a market increasingly defined by low-cost carriers and the Internet.
Horizon Air A paradox of the regional airline business as practiced in North America is that in order to achieve admittedly impressive rates of growth and financial returns, most of the participants have had to forgo their own brand and market identity in favor of becoming a piece in a larger partner's machine. There is no denying that the business model works, although as recent events show, regionals risk being viewed and treated by their larger partners as so many interchangeable parts.
