Lantal Textiles said it created a new Pneumatic Systems Division to "assert its firm belief in the market potential of this technology." The first product, "an adaptive cushion for a business class seat, was successfully commercialized last year," the company stated.
Cathay Pacific Airways, ATW's 2006 Airline of the Year, emphatically stamped itself as one the world's strongest performers with a profit of HK$3.47 billion ($446.9 million) in 2005 despite a 38% rise in fuel prices.
In anticipation of a long, possibly contentious debate over the September 2007 reauthorization of the US Airport and Airways Trust Fund and the state of air traffic control and management systems, the Air Transport Assn. and its president and CEO, James May, fired the first salvo at a news conference in Washington yesterday, announcing "historic" unanimous support of ATA's 19 member carriers for a comprehensive revamp of the nation's ATC system and the use of operation frequencies and flight times as the sole acceptable metrics for determining trust fund contributions.
SAS said it finalized a full-content agreement with Worldspan under which the airline will provide the GDS "with all fares, schedules and availability including published low fare classes and Web fares that are available through SAS's own reservations and ticket agents as well as SAS Group websites."
ATW Media Group Editorial Director J. A. Donoghue announced he will leave at the end of March to become director of publications at the Alexandria, Va.-based Flight Safety Foundation.
Boeing signed Goodrich Aerostructures Service Center Asia to perform nacelle component MRO services on 737NGs and 777s. GASCA is the fourth member of the airframer's Repair Network Service Center program.
United Airlines will upgrade its inflight audio entertainment with the inclusion of up to 19 music channels provided by XM Satellite Radio during a "promotional period," the carrier announced.
Ryanair took delivery of its 100th 737-800. It now has an all 737-800 fleet with an average age of two years. It said its $7.5 billion program to replace its dash 200s with dash 800s has resulted in a 50% reduction in CO2 emissions per seat, a 45% reduction in fuel burn per seat and a 45% reduction in noise emissions. Over the next six years it will take delivery of an additional 139 737-800s, bringing the total fleet to 239 aircraft.
SITA announced the launch of AgentSelect, "an end-to-end solution for multinational travel agencies, tour operators and travel management companies." Pricing is subscription-based with a fixed monthly fee and is offered on a lease contract basis.
Delta Air Lines announced a significant summer expansion at New York JFK comprising 46 daily mainline and Delta Connection flights to 17 destinations. The vast majority of the flights will be operated to cities in the Northeast US by Delta Connection carriers Comair and Freedom Airlines, the latter a wholly owned subsidiary of Mesa Air Group. New mainline services are a daily flight to Las Vegas and an additional daily frequency to San Diego.
Carmen Systems of Sweden, which is being acquired by Boeing, announced that Virgin Atlantic Airways has fully implemented its Carmen crew rostering and bidding system.
In the first such deal among the four major global distribution systems, Amadeus and Sabre Holdings announced they entered into an agreement that enables "Amadeus customers to complete bookings on an airline [through Sabre] in the unlikely event of that airline withdrawing from participation in Amadeus," and vice versa. The agreement only applies to airlines participating in both GDSs, so it would not affect a carrier such as Southwest Airlines, which currently participates in Sabre but not Amadeus.
EasyJet announced yesterday the addition of 10 new routes and five new destinations: London Gatwick-Split four-times-weekly from May 2, London Luton-Bordeaux daily from June 29, Luton-Rimini four-times-weekly from June 29, Edinburgh-Alicante weekly from May 20, Bristol-Toulouse daily from July 21, Bristol-Krakow four-times-weekly from July 21, Bristol-La Rochelle four-times-weekly from July 21, Bristol-Marseille thrice-weekly from July 22, Bristol-Rijeka thrice-weekly from July 22 and Paris Orly-Ajaccio daily from July 14.
Latin American Airline Assn. issued a statement Monday protesting "massive air transport fee increases" by the Jamaican government and warning that some members already are rethinking current and future operations. AITAL said Jamaica raised overflight fees by 180%, boosted communication fees and instituted a jet fuel storage and handling fee of 3.7 cents per gal. "We are outraged that a country so dependent on air travel and tourism would choose to raise costs so significantly with no justification," AITAL Executive Director Alex de Gunten said.
Silk Air, Singapore Airlines' regional subsidiary, is planning to issue an RFP next month for replacements for its fleet of 12 A320s. The RFP almost certainly will include 70/90-seat regional jets. According to sources at the carrier, while the A320 is the incumbent fleet type, the 737-800 and dash 900ER will be evaluated. Silk Air selected the A320 in 1998 to replace its fleet of 737-300s.
Air France-KLM said it posted a "further good performance both in terms of traffic and unit revenue" in February. Traffic increased 8.5% over the year-ago month to 13.93 billion RPKs on a 6.9% rise in capacity to 17.93 billion ASKs. Load factor improved 1.1 points to 77.7%. The group carried nearly 5 million passengers, up 5.1%. SAS Group carried 2.7 million passengers in February, up 11.4% compared to the same month last year. RPKs increased 8.5% and ASKs declined 2.3%, resulting in a load factor of 66.1%, up 6.6 points.
Phuket Air shareholders scrapped the airline and applied for a fresh license for a new carrier called Suvarnabhumi Airlines, according The Nation newspaper. The new airline will fly from Bangkok to Ranong, Buri Ram, Chiang Mai and Phuket with two 737s. Shareholders also filed to launch a second carrier called Holiday Airlines, which will operate to Beijing, Seoul and Tokyo using three 747s. Phuket Air had a troubled past, with technical problems grounding aircraft around the world.
Kenya Airways continued its strong association with Boeing by becoming the 28th airline to sign up for the 787 with an order for six dash 8s. The 787s will replace the carrier's six 767s, with two to be delivered in 2010 and four in 2011. Kenya Airways carries more than 2 million passengers annually and has the largest network into Africa. It operates a 21-aircraft fleet comprising mostly 737s, 767s and 777s. Boeing said it has 385 orders and commitments for the Dreamliner.
Airbus said it received orders for 52 aircraft in February from two customers. Air China ordered nine A319s and Indian Airlines finalized a previously announced order for 43 A320 family aircraft. In February 2005, Airbus booked orders for five aircraft--three A319s and two A320s. In the first two months of 2006, it sold 71 aircraft compared with 43 in the year-ago period. Boeing booked orders for 26 aircraft in the period Feb. 1-March 1 inclusive ( ATWOnline, March 6).
Airbus announced yesterday that production of the A300/A310 family will come to an end in July 2007 with the handover of the last A300-600F currently on order. "It is in Airbus's best business interest to optimize the use of its resources at this time. . .in response to growing demand from our customers for the newer Airbus products like the A321, the A330/A340 family and the new A350 aircraft," President and CEO Gustav Humbert explained in a statement.
Northwest Airlines' 7,677 customer service and reservations staff, represented by the International Assn. of Machinists, voted yesterday to ratify a concessionary contract with the airline, while 5,632 equipment service employees, also represented by IAM, rejected a similar agreement.
Insiders at Boeing suggest that the replacement for the 737 could be a twin-aisle composite aircraft. The company announced last week that it has formed a team headed by Mike Cave, Boeing Commercial Airplanes VP-aircraft programs, to evaluate a new design. Initial research has focused on the 100-200 seat category, but Embraer's 190 and 195 already are strong competitors at the bottom end of that market segment.
ARINC will provide comprehensive technical and maintenance support for check-in systems, flight information displays and additional IT systems at Dallas/Ft. Worth's new International Terminal D, which opened in July 2005.
Russian airlines reported a combined RUB2.2 billion ($78.7 million) drop in net profit in 2005, according to a statement from the Federal Air Transport Agency cited by Russian media. Revenues increased 10% to RUB180 billion against a 20% lift in costs. The number of passengers grew 3.9% to 35.1 million and passenger revenues rose 3.4%.
