Southwest Airlines authorized a new share repurchase program to buy back $300 million worth of common stock, or an estimated 20.2 million shares. CEO Gary Kelly said WN has repurchased 62.1 million shares worth $1 billion since the beginning of 2006. Separately, Southwest named Senior Chief Pilot Chuck Magill VP-flight operations.
Iberia reached a labor agreement with its 4,200 flight attendants that will include the conversion of 260 temporary contracts into permanent positions, pay raises linked to company performance, a lump payment of more than €7 million ($9.3 million) and "a number of employee benefits," according to IB. The deal is effective through Dec. 31. Separately, Iberia will add a third weekly Madrid-Algiers flight starting April 11.
Delta Air Lines said last week that it filed its election to obtain the benefit of the pension funding relief provided in the Pension Protection Act for the defined benefit retirement plan covering ground employees and flight attendants and that it made a voluntary $50 million contribution to the plan. It expects to contribute an additional $50 million this year as part of the funding schedule mandated by the new federal law.
Pratt & Whitney Global Service Partners signed a seven-year engine management program deal with Martinair covering on-wing performance monitoring services for the carrier's 59 PW4000s.
US airlines' capacity is expected to grow 2.8% and traffic 3.4% in 2007, FAA forecasts. Mainline domestic capacity is expected to increase 2.1% in 2007 and 3.6% in 2008. Latin American Air Transport Assn.'s 33 member airlines flew 11.15 billion RPKs in January, down 7.6% from the year-ago month, a decline the organization attributed to cutbacks at Varig. Capacity fell 4.9% to 15.89 billion ASKs and load factor dropped 2.1 points to 70.2%.
AirAsia's planned low-cost, long-haul AirAsia X service, originally scheduled to start in July with flights to the UK ( ATWOnline, Jan. 10), likely will be delayed until next year owing to lack of aircraft, according to press reports. "We are looking at the cost structure, the right aircraft," CEO Raja Azmi Mohamad told Malaysian media, the BBC reported.
Futura International Airways, a charter carrier based in Palma de Mallorca, will become the first European operator of the 737-900ER when it takes delivery of two next year, Commercial Director Juan Munoz de Baena told ATWOnline. It also will take two 737-800s in 2009 and another in 2010. Futura currently operates 13 -800s, three 737-300s and 13 737-400s. Despite the fleet expansion, it is challenged by the seasonality of the European charter business dominated by the summer high season.
Qatar Airways won Australian government approval for daily service to Melbourne, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Transport Mark Vaile told reporters last week. QR also can introduce a second daily service to an additional Australian city next year. In response, Qantas CEO Geoff Dixon said his airline "will have no option but to achieve further cost savings if it is to remain competitive" now that more carriers are gaining access to the country.
Air Arabia's AED2.57 billion ($698.9 million) IPO was scheduled to launch yesterday as 55% of the airline's share capital equal to 2.57 billion shares was put up for sale. The shares will be listed on the Dubai Financial Market upon completion of the 10-day IPO, which the carrier said is the largest in United Arab Emirates history.
ANA's North American customer relations and service office near Los Angeles was raided last Thursday by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Associated Press reported. The FBI declined to comment on the nature of the warrant, but ANA said there was "no suspicion of terrorism and the ANA flights are operating normally," AP said.
Boeing added 46 orders to its backlog last week including 27 aircraft for unidentified customers: Six 747-8s (understood to be freighters), six 777s (understood to be -300ERs for Virgin Blue) and 15 787s.
US airlines will have to invest $20-$25 billion through 2025 to equip aircraft for FAA's planned satellite-based NextGen system, according to ATA President and CEO James May, who spoke yesterday at the agency's annual Aviation Forecast Conference in Washington.
British Airways lost its appeal at the European Court of Justice against a €6.8 million ($9 million) fine imposed by the EC in July 1999 for "abuse of a dominant position" in the UK market. As in most cases, the ECJ followed the advice of its advocate general, who said in February that the appeal should be dismissed in its entirety. Following a complaint by Virgin Atlantic Airways, the EC ruled in 1999 that performance reward schemes implemented by BA in order to calculate travel agent commissions constituted an abuse.
LOT Polish Airlines reported a PLN539.8 million ($182.6 million) profit in 2006, largely from asset sales. A year-ago comparison was not provided. The carrier earned $27.3 million in 2005, according to ATW's "World Airline Report." Revenues from "basic operations" fell 0.4%, according to LOT, to PLN2.76 billion and costs rose 4.2% to PLN2.79 billion. Pre-tax earnings of PLN605.8 million represented a fivefold increase over the year-ago result, a figure that was achieved "from single transactions of sale of the company's assets." It did not elaborate.
Lufthansa Technik launched a dedicated Web suite allowing aircraft operators to monitor and manage all aspects of their fleets' technical operations via the Internet. Dubbed manage/m, the toolbox of Web-based modules is designed to "give the operator total control over the MRO requirements and operations of his fleet, anytime and everywhere," LHT VP-Customer Services-Aircraft Maintenance & Engineering Alexander Heilmann told ATWOnline in Frankfurt. Manage/m comprises 15 modules covering every aspect of MRO management.
Bombardier spokesperson told ATWOnline that 12 of the 13 Q400s grounded by ANA following Tuesday's emergency landing at Kochi are back in the air ( ATWOnline, March 14). The aircraft that experienced the landing gear malfunction remains grounded as inspectors investigate the cause. Other Q series operators have inspected their aircraft and found nothing unsafe, Bombardier said.
Airbus appeared to be on the verge of winning a significant order yesterday as reports from Moscow indicated that Aeroflot is close to announcing a major buy. Aeroflot CEO Valery Okulov told reporters at a news conference that SU was planning to sign a contract for 22 A350 XWBs with deliveries beginning in 2015. Reuters reported that Okulov said, "The deal will be done."
VLM Airlines is not talking with British Airways about a possible sale of the regional carrier that is currently the largest operator at London City, owner Jaap Rosen Jacobson told ATWOnline, putting to rest speculation that arose following BA's launch of CityFlyer ( ATWOnline, March 15). VLM accounts for about one-third of all aircraft movements at LCY. "There has been no negotiation with BA on this subject," Jacobson said. "I'm not saying a sale of VLM might not happen. One never knows.
LTU will launch service from Dusseldorf to Los Angeles (five-times-weekly from May 3) and Las Vegas (twice-weekly from May 3). It also will unveil a new livery when it takes delivery of its 12th A330, a -200, in May. Design will remain red and white, with a touch of silver added, and feature a larger logo on the tail. The new look "stands for the transformation of the former vacation carrier into an airline with standard routes and extremely attractive price-to-performance ratios for vacationers and business travelers."
Tiger Airways was given the green light by Australia's Foreign Investment Review Board to proceed with the creation of Tiger Airways Australia ( ATWOnline, Feb. 12). Tiger said FIRB found that "the creation of Tiger Airways Australia was consistent with the government's foreign investment policy and did not place any specific conditions on the creation of the new airline." TAA now will now work toward securing its AOC.
Cyprus Airways' 2006 full-year loss narrowed to CYP7.2 million ($16.5 million) from CYP22.6 million in 2005 as it began to benefit from its restructuring initiatives. It said in January that it expects to be profitable this year ( ATWOnline, Jan. 4). It said improved yield and an increase in RPKs fueled a 10.7% rise in revenue to CYP157 million. Operating costs fell 0.8% to CYP159.8 million, which the airline credited to the layoffs that were part of its restructuring program.
Responding to calls for guidance from shareholders considering Airline Partners Australia's bid to buy the carrier, Qantas confirmed yesterday that a pre-tax profit of A$1.23 billion ($962.8 million), which matches an average of analysts' expectations, is likely for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2008.
