Four major alliances - Star, oneworld, KLM/Northwest and Delta/Swissair - have 52% of worldwide airline revenues but 73% of the profits, says Austrian's alliance chief, Paul Paflik. Within Europe, Star, British Airways/Iberia and Qualiflyer each has a 20% share of traffic. KLM/Alitalia has 13% and uncommitted Air France 7%.
Nav Canada will propose its modern oceanic automation technology to help FAA update aging equipment at New York, Oakland and Anchorage. Nav Canada says that over the years, the Gander automated air traffic system has been "continually modernized to detect long-range conflicts and to reduce controller workload."
Sabena Group reported a surge in revenue last year and a pre-tax profit that jumped to 2.7 billion Belgian francs (US$73.2 million), four times the 1997 earnings. The group showed net earnings of BEF703 million ($20 million), versus a loss of BEF2.5 billion ($70 million) a year earlier. The airline operations of Sabena Group had a better net profit of BEF1.26 billion ($34.5 million). Revenue swelled 21% to BEF86.8 billion ($2.4 billion).
...ASA reliability has improved over recent months, a company spokesman tells The DAILY, which reported a cancellation rate at Chattanooga of as much as 20% (DAILY, Feb. 19). Since August the dispatch rate has averaged 98% with a high of 100% in October and a low of 96.4% in January, he said, noting that earlier in the year for perhaps one month it could have been that high. The attrition rate for mechanics in early 1998 was quite high, the spokesman added. Delta agreed to acquire the 72% of ASA it does not own for $34 per share.
Airline stocks will "remain turbulent" this year unless carriers reduce capacity growth in the second half of 1999, said BT Alex Brown analyst Susan Donofrio.While some stocks, including regionals, have their own success stories, Donofrio's expected 8.2% third quarter and 5.5% fourth quarter capacity increases cloud this year's outlook.
DHL Taiwan projects a 5% increase in express parcel revenues this year. The company reported air express revenues of NT$466 million for 1998, down 19.2% from 1997. Air cargo volume also fell last year, by 0.5%.
DOT Special Counsel Steven Okun will leave the department to handle international affairs for United Parcel Service in Washington, D.C. He will remain at DOT for the next few months at Secretary Rodney Slater's request as deputy general counsel to continue work on aviation competition and consumer matters.
American Eagle launched jet service between Long Island MacArthur Airport and Chicago O'Hare. American Eagle is augmenting American Airlines' two existing roundtrip flights by operating the two new flights with 50-passenger ERJ-145 jets, for a total of four Long Island-Chicago roundtrips.
All Nippon Airways yesterday made several difficult decisions to strengthen the airline long-term and improve its challenging 1999 outlook. Japan's largest airline will retire some aircraft early, reduce frequencies on eight international routes, end service to three international destinations, restructure five domestic routes and abandon three others. ANA will start service to several destinations, including Tokyo-Chicago in April and Tokyo-Shanghai this summer, and will put smaller aircraft on some routes because of lower traffic.
European Commission official Hugo Paemen said David Aaron, under secretary of Commerce, misled the Senate when he told a Finance Committee hearing that when the hushkit rule goes into effect, "literally hundreds of U.S. aircraft could no longer be used" (DAILY, Feb. 19). Paemen, in a Feb. 24 letter to Aaron, said the response "clearly left the committee with the incorrect impression that the regulation would interrupt current operations into the territory of the EU."
Regional air carriers posted an average load factor of 50.1% during January, based on a sampling of 16 of the nation's largest regional airlines. That was an improvement of 1.8 percentage points over the year-ago period's 48.4%. United Express Air Wisconsin was the only carrier to top the 60% level - barely at 60.6%. Six of the carriers had load factors in the 50% to 59% range and nine were in the 40s. The largest increase was again posted by Air Wisconsin at nearly 7.9 points. Continental Express was closely behind with a 7.3-point jump to 54.8%.
Billings, Mont.-based Big Sky Transportation sold 134,372 shares of 1996 Series Common Stock to venture capital firm Northern Rockies Venture Fund Limited Partnership of Butte, Mont., generating proceeds of $235,151, Big Sky said.
Delta, in an effort to strengthen management of its domestic and international networks, has named Wayne Aaron director-domestic network analysis, responsible for hub development initiatives, new market analysis, revenue analysis and performance tracking. Aaron, who has been with Delta since 1991, will be replaced as director-international network analysis by Harlan Bennett, formerly director-domestic pricing and revenue management.
United Parcel Service gave Pratt&Whitney the nod to power as many as 75 new Airbus A300 freighters, a deal worth about $3 billion, including a long-term maintenance agreement, P&W said yesterday. Deliveries of the PW4158-powered A300F4-600Rs start in mid-2000. Firm orders cover 30 twin-engine aircraft, and UPS holds options for another 45. Options would extend deliveries into 2009. The order is a big boost for the enginemaker at a time when new orders - particularly large ones for big, high-margin aircraft - are slim.
Minneapolis-based Sun Country Airlines is introducing enhanced menus on all flights. The carrier is adding fresh sandwiches, fruit and muffins, fresh-baked warm cookies, yogurt and hot soft pretzels with cheddar cheese filling to its meal offerings. Sun Country will become a scheduled air carrier on June 1.
Polish airline LOT has placed firm orders for six Embraer ERJ-145 regional jets and six options in a transaction valued at about US$200 million, Embraer announced. First delivery is set for July 1999. Embraer Chief Executive Mauricio Botelho said the deal was the company's first ERJ-145 transaction involving one of the Eastern European countries. LOT becomes the seventh European operator of the aircraft.
Traffic at Singapore Airlines recovered in 1998. Although the number of passengers carried increased only by 1.1% to 12.4 million, revenue passenger kilometers grew 4.9% to 58.2 billion and revenue ton kilometers gained 2.5% to 10.4 billion. But capacity rose faster than traffic, so the passenger load factor fell 1.6 percentage points to 70.9% and the overall load factor dropped 2.6 points to 67.7%. The airline is operating 91 aircraft and has 37 on order, plus 46 options.
American and its Allied Pilots Association union, battling since December over the carrier's acquisition of Reno Air, have agreed on two items - they need a mediator to help resolve the dispute, and they will not discuss the talks with the media. In separate brief statements, the two parties said they will hold two more direct bargaining sessions and if agreement still is out of reach, they will participate in mediated talks for up to three days.
FAA Administrator Jane Garvey's speech Tuesday before the Aero Club of Washington, will be featured on Aviation News Today, to be broadcast Sunday on Washington's NewsChannel 8 at 12:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.
