The SAirGroup, parent of Swissair and regional carrier Crossair, has named Mario A. Conti chairman, succeeding Eric Honegger who will step down on Apr. 25, a year earlier than expected. Conti, who leaves his post as chief financial officer at Nestle next month, has been a member of SAirGroup's executive management board since last year. He was a driving force behind a move to abandon SAirGroup's ``hunter'' strategy of investing in smaller, financially troubled carriers as a way to expand the company's European presence.
Regulations that make it virtually impossible for families of soldiers killed in accidents to hold the military accountable mean that Bell Helicopter Textron and Boeing will shoulder the brunt of the legal attacks from last year's V-22 crashes. The strategy to hold the contractor, rather than the military, accountable became clear when attorneys representing some families of last April's crash of a V-22 laid out their case during a public hearing.
The European Commission plans legislative proposals this year that could take effect in 2005, moving from today's balkanized setup toward a European air traffic management system. With traffic congestion causing delays for 21% of all flights last year, and growth expected to continue at 7% a year, the countries have little choice.
William J. Lynn, former comptroller of the Defense Dept., has been appointed vice president of Washington-based DFI International and a principal of its investment subsidiary SwannStreet Ventures.
Small and medium-sized businesses that don't want to spend the time and money on their own computerized logistics system will soon be able to obtain that service over the Internet from Ixedius. It is a new company formed by a partnership of SAirLogistics, the airfreight and logistics arm of SAirGroup, and Manugistics, the supplier network specialist. Logistics data will be fed to Ixedius via the Web, which will return an optimized flow of goods to customers.
Scott Abrams, president of the Omnicon Group, Hauppauge, N.Y., has been named Reliability Engineer of the Year by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers. He was cited for ``continued excellence in the field of reliability and product design and for fostering reliability as a discipline in undergraduate education.''
David F. Stafford has become Washington-based vice president-business strategy and development for the Airborne Early Warning and Electronic Warfare Systems business area of ISS. He was director of business development and strategic planning for the Electronic Warfare Systems Integrated Product Team.
Preparing for a Mar. 26 walkout of its pilots, the Delta Connection carrier Comair last week began a gradual reduction in its 800 daily flights and unwrapped a plan at its Cincinnati base to accommodate passengers at owner Delta Air Lines and six other U.S. carriers. Negotiations continued between Comair and the Air Line Pilots Assn. The appointment of a Presidential Emergency Board could push back the strike deadline.
Phoenix-based Mesa Air Group has become the U.S. launch customer for the Bombardier Aerospace CRJ900 regional jet. The parent of Mesa Airlines signed a letter of intent (LOI) last week for up to 80 -900s. The anticipated deal calls for the regional airline to purchase 20 of the 86-seat -900s plus 40 options, and the same number of 65-seat CRJ700s. Value of the firm order portion could be worth around $1.2 billion, with deliveries to begin in the first quarters of 2002 and 2003 for the -700s and the -900, respectively.
French researchers are working to select a Russian partner by the end of the year to conduct joint flight tests of a supersonic combustion ramjet beginning in 2008 to 2010. The research tests would demonstrate that scramjets are capable of generating a net positive thrust and validate that French researchers can accurately model the thrust and drag balances critical to predicting scramjet performance.
The final phase of Iberia's privatization got underway last week when the Spanish state holding company SEPI launched a long-delayed initial public offering for the remaining 53.9% of its shares in the carrier. Shares are due to start trading on Apr. 3. Value of the IPO for Iberia is around $1.4 billion. The carrier holds an 18.3% stake in the Amadeus computer reservation system. The government will retain a controlling ``golden share'' in Iberia, which faces tough negotiations with unions over wages (AW&ST Mar. 12, p. 44).
Herbert D. Kelleher's decision to resign as president of Southwest Airlines on June 19 signals a new era in leadership that will test the ability of his successors to guide the trend-setting, low-fare carrier into the 21st century.
Eilene Theilig has become project manager of the Galileo spacecraft mission at Jupiter at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. She was deputy project manager and succeeds Jim Erickson, who has become JPL's mission manager for rovers that NASA plans to send to Mars in 2003. Dennis Flower has been appointed manager of NASA's Earth Observing System Microwave Limb Sounder. And, James Graf has become manager of NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter mission. He was manager of the Quick Scatterometer mission and the development of its SeaWinds radar instrument.
Former ``headhunter'' Michael Benante has launched www.aeroindustryjobs.com for candidate screening, job listings and recruiting for manufacturers, airlines and maintenance and overhaul sites. His initial clients include GE Aircraft Engines, Smiths Industries Aerospace, Bombardier, Dee Howard Aircraft Maintenance, Sargent Controls&Aerospace and Derco Aerospace. Benante reports they are seeking employees from the engineering level up to vice presidents and CEOs.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Kawasaki Heavy Industries are likely to accept Boeing's recent invitation to help convert 757s and 767s into freighters. Under the program, the Japanese manufacturers would build and supply cargo doors and related fuselage panels. The earliest delivery of the first shipset of doors to Boeing is expected by summer.
A group of private investors is ready to commit 200 million euros to the development and validation of the proposed Galileo satellite navigation system, officials close to the project said last week. The commitment was obtained at a recent meeting of industry leaders and officials from the European Commission and European Space Agency in Brussels in an effort to meet last-minute conditions imposed by the Netherlands, Germany and the U.K. (AW&ST Mar. 19, p. 31).
The U.K. faces the prospects of further flight of its technological capabilities and intellectual assets unless there is a concerted effort to develop and invest in a technology blueprint for the future, according to BAE Systems Chairman Sir Richard Evans.
The demise of Russia's Mir also marks with fiery finality the end of the space race that created this outmoded space station. Built as a symbol of Soviet technical prowess in the Cold War days when the U.S. was concentrating on the space shuttle, Mir wound up as a testament to the persistence, ingenuity and skill of the Russian engineers and cosmonauts who kept it going long past its planned service life. Its name--the Russian equivalent of ``World Peace''--smacked of propaganda, but in the end it even did a bit to advance that lofty goal.
NASA expects Russia to drop its insistence that millionaire California businessman Dennis Tito fly to the International Space Station on a Soyuz capsule next month. Tito's health, plus pacts governing station operations, give the Russians an out. The European Space Agency has proposed astronaut Thomas Reiter, a German Mir veteran and Soyuz-certified commander, as a paying backup to Tito, and ESA doesn't have to contend with the congressional strings on spending money in Russia that NASA does (AW&ST Mar. 19, p. 33). Tito has irritated senior U.S.
Huang Cheng Eng is scheduled to be promoted on May 1 to executive vice president-marketing and regions from senior vice president-market planning of Singapore Airlines. Michael Tan and Chew Choon Seng will be promoted to senior executive vice president from executive vice president. Maj. Gen. Raymund Ng Teck Heng has been appointed senior vice president-flight operations projects, effective July 1. He is chief of air force in the Singapore Ministry of Defense.
Canadian airlines are among the first to seek passage to India via polar routes, which offer many benefits to both carriers and passengers. Airlines reap fuel savings. Passengers may expect a reduction of flying time by more than 4 hr., compared to traditional routes. Canada 3000 last week confirmed plans to begin services via the North Pole to Mumbai and Delhi via Vancouver and Toronto beginning in early October. The carrier's opening of a Delhi office is imminent, and an airline official says its schedule of North America-India services soon will be announced.
AAR Corp. last week posted a 51% drop in net income, to $5.4 million or 20 cents a share, on a 22% decline in sales to $200.1 million for the fiscal quarter ended Feb. 28, compared with the same period a year ago. The company attributed the sharply lower results to ``continuing difficult industry conditions.'' Management took some comfort in the knowledge that net income and EPS were higher for the third consecutive quarter, and they expect modest improvement to continue in the current period as well.
Inventory Locator Service is partnering with IHS Engineering to give ILSmart.com customers access to IHS' collection of industry and corporate standards and U.S. military specifications. Customers of the IHS www.techsavvy.com/parts site will be able to access ILS' basic parts information and link to its BidQuest procurement site. . . . A new/old name has entered Web-based aircraft trading.
As Chinese Deputy Prime Minister Qian Qichen came to town, a new Brookings Institution report warned that the Taiwan Strait is apt to remain a security hot spot well into this decade. Deriding fierce Chinese objections, Congress is inclined to sell more sophisticated weapons to Taiwan as democracy takes deeper hold there, even as China's military justifies its 18% spending jump on a truculent promise to restore Beijing's sovereignty over its island neighbor.
