Amadeus entered into a deal with TravelSky Technology Ltd. to provide China's only computer reservation system access to Amadeus' inventory of some 58,000 hotels, 50 car rental companies and numerous other travel-related products including ferry, rail, and cruise operations. About 7,000 Chinese travel agents subscribe to TravelSky, a Chinese CRS. It is also the leading foreign airline booking distributor with more than 28,000 user terminals placed across 300 cities and 130 airports in China.
American Trans Air's parent ATA Holdings said that beginning July 1, the company's stock ticker symbol will change from "AMTR" to "ATAH." The change comes a month after the company's shareholders voted to change the name of the parent company from Amtran Inc. to ATA Holdings Corp. during the annual meeting in May. ATA's common stock trades on the Nasdaq stock market.
Preliminary analysis of the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) from China Airlines Flight 611 yielded some new evidence but no obvious clues that explain why the Boeing 747-200 broke apart during a seemingly routine flight last month (DAILY, May 30), investigators said.
Air Canada Jazz has introduced Business Flex and Super Low Fares, pricing initiatives affecting 28 routes within Air Canada's domestic network, including Edmonton, Calgary, Halifax, Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. Web-based fares of up to 75% off regular business fares are available for travel as of Friday. Air Canada said the fares are intended to stimulate passenger traffic on regional services. Booking through the Internet will save the company distribution costs. Depending on the customer response, the initiative may be extended to other markets.
House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas) recently asked the Department of Justice to complete its investigation of Orbitz because he believes that leaving the case open too long will harm the industry. Armey said in a June 21 letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft that DOJ's antitrust division has supposedly been reviewing Orbitz for two years, yet "no federal agency to date has found any anti-competitive problems with the online company."
Traffic to the Trip.com online agency grew to 2.4 million unique visitors in May 2002, a 217% increase from May 2001, according to Jupiter Media Metrix. The jump was partly due to its relaunch on April 29 and subsequent $40 million advertising and marketing campaign. Trip.com traffic increased 66% from April, and new registered users on Trip.com nearly doubled in the month following the relaunch. Call volume to Trip.com's contact centers has more than doubled since the end of April.
KLM plans to set up a new no-frills airline in October. The new carrier will be made up of Basiq Air and buzz, the two existing low-cost operations within the group. KLM Chairman and CEO Leo van Wjik said in an interview that both will break even this year. He added that KLM continues talks with several European airlines on bilateral alliances but has put on hold merger attempts similar to what was planned with British Airways almost two years ago, until the European Court of Justice rules on air traffic bilaterals later this year.
In the five-year dispute between Brazil and Canada on export subsidies for Embraer and Bombardier aircraft, respectively, the World Trade Organization's dispute settlement body this week supported Brazil's right to trade retaliations against Canada for damages arising from such subsidies. While the retaliatory figure of $3.36 billion has been mentioned, the WTO's body instructed Brazil to postpone further action until the final amount is determined.
Transportation Security Administration said last week it was accepting job applications for screeners at 30 airports, using its web site and a toll-free number to recruit screeners to identify "dangerous objects in baggage, cargo and on passengers. They also are responsible for preventing those objects from being transported onto aircraft by using diverse, cutting-edge electronic detection and imaging equipment in a courteous and professional manner."
Although the summer delay season is their top priority at the moment, Boston Logan and Denver airports are investing in new equipment to reduce winter snow delays. Boston plans to cut the airport's snow-clearing runway closure time in half by expanding its fleet of snow ploughs, while Denver is purchasing more than two dozen new snow-clearing vehicles to clear the acres of extra concrete its new runway will bring next year.
The European Commission renewed yesterday an antitrust exemption -- a so-called "block exemption" -- for IATA's interlining agreements until June 30, 2005. The current exemption was due to expire at the end of June 2002. After consulting governments, airlines, travel agents and consumer groups, the commission concluded that "interlining brings both economic and consumer benefits and is valued by passengers," even though the tariff conferences on which they are based "are a restriction of competition in that they involve price fixing."
NTSB Chair Marion Blakey yesterday asked the Senate Commerce Committee for a $76.7 million budget reauthorization and 448 full time employees in fiscal 2003. Aviation subcommittee Chair John Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), who chaired the full committee, said he supported Blakey's request, which is about $2 million higher than the President's budget proposal. Of the fiscal 2003 budget request, $3.34 million and five full-time employees would go toward a new academy, scheduled to open in fall 2003.
America West CEO Doug Parker believes the industry will not become profitable until next year at the earliest. "Demand needs to catch up with supply...It's not going to happen in 2002," he said this week, but he is hopeful it will happen in 2003. "As the economy rebounds, demand will too." Whenever the industry reaches breakeven, however, AWA "will have gotten there sooner" than the competition, he said.
US Airways will defer certain lease payments to cut costs while implementing its broad restructuring plan. The airline also is trying to convince the Air Transportation Stabilization Board (ATSB) that it is well on its way to reducing operating costs by up to $1.3 billion annually over seven years. The payment deferrals focus primarily on aircraft lessors and lenders, including aircraft that are grounded and selected older Boeing aircraft in service.
Honduras startup Sol Air will begin flights in July from Miami to Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula, Honduras; Managua, Nicaragua, and San Salvador, El Salvador, using Boeing 737-200s and Super 727s. VP Richard Saumell says Sol Air will compete in the region American and Grupo Taca, offering all-year roundtrip fares of $399 in economy and $499 in business class; no charge for stopovers, and two choices of hot entrees in both classes. It will also pay 10% travel agent commission.
SITA, the air transport info-tech specialist, is teamed with Canada's Customs and Revenue Agency to develop a system letting government agencies review and analyze details on all passengers traveling on in-bound international flights to Canada. The idea is to check passengers against a range of agency databases to quickly identify those warranting further questioning at the airport, using everything from passenger name records (PNRs) to data from existing global distribution, reservation and departure control systems
FAA on Friday plans to publish its Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) for Boston Logan Airport's proposed new runway. The report is expected to contain further details and analysis of a wind-restriction concept for the runway and will also propose deferring a decision on the center-field taxiway proposal.
AeroContinente Chile, a subsidiary of Peru-based AeroContinente, filed for bankruptcy this week before Santiago's 18th Civil Court after operating in Chile for four years. Lupe Zevallos, chairman of the parent company, arrived from Lima to file the request personally two weeks after Chile's civil aviation department ordered the airline grounded for several irregularities (DAILY, June 12).
A group of aviation consulting firms has launched a study of the future of North American aviation, said Douglas Abbey, president of AvStat Associates. The Aviation Industry Restructuring Project comprises a consortium that includes AvStat, Global Aviation Associates and Stanford Transportation Group. It will look at the changed market conditions for aviation and its impact on demand for new transport and business aircraft. Airframe manufacturers, suppliers and airport authorities sponsor the evaluation.
Japan's Hokkaido International Airlines, better known as Air Do, has filed for bankruptcy protection. Launched in 1998, the low-fare carrier finished its fiscal year in March with 824 million yen (US$6.8 million) in losses and debts of some 6 billion yen (US$49 million). Air Do could get some help from All Nippon Airways, which is in talks with the carrier for a wide-ranging alliance.
Japan Airlines plans to start new four weekly flights between Tokyo and Hanoi effective June 29 in a code-share with Vietnam Airlines. JAL, in cooperation with Vietnam Airlines, inaugurated Japan-Vietnam flights in November 1994 on the Osaka-Ho Chi Minh City route and service to Ho Chi Minh City from Tokyo started in November 2000. JAL also plans to start a daily code share flight between Tokyo and Melbourne beginning Aug. 1 in cooperation with code-share partner Qantas, subject to government approval. Qantas aircraft and crew will operate the flight.
Thomas Cook AG, the Lufthansa and Karstadt Quelle AG joint venture, ordered two Airbus Industrie A320 narrowbody jetliners, Airbus reported Tuesday. Terms weren't disclosed, but typically A320s sell for prices in the range of US$50 million.
