Air Transport

With its merger with Vanilla Air complete, Japanese LCC Peach Aviation is now looking to hire more pilots while expanding its capacity and network.

Munich-based MTU Aero Engines is projecting high-single-digit increases in its key commercial engine production and MRO segments in 2020, continuing current-year trends that point to steady new-production and aftermarket services demand.

Hong Kong’s Air Transport Licensing Authority (ATLA) is giving Hong Kong Airlines (HKA) until Dec. 7 to find a new investor or avenue to inject cash into its airline operations, or risk having its airline license revoked or suspended.

EASA has given Airbus approval to raise the maximum passenger number on the A350-1000 from 440 to 480.

Cathay Pacific Airways plans to make further cuts in capacity in 2020 as it continues to grapple with a demand slowdown prompted by civil unrest in Hong Kong.

Brazil’s third-largest airline Azul has forged an MOU to sublease a portion of its older Embraer E195 jets as part of its transition to the new Embraer E195-E2.

South African Airways (SAA) and its wholly-owned subsidiary and low cost carrier, Mango Airlines, made history in 2016 as the first two airlines in Africa to operate commercial flights respectively, which were powered by sustainable aviation fuel produced from Sunchem’s nicotine-free tobacco plant, Solaris.

Long-term future hinges upon finding new production facility—and closing more deals.

JETLINES launched legal proceedings against David Neeleman, DGN and Breeze Aviation Group for interfering with its startup.

I-JET AVIATION purchased 95% of EUROATLANTIC AIRWAYS, Portugal for US$128m.

ELBIT SYSTEMS had $72.3m net income on $286m revenues in 3Q19 vs $64.7m on $256m in 3Q18. It has $9.8b backlog.

LUFTHANSA GROUP received Executive Board approval to sell LSG Group's European business to GATEGROUP.

COULSON AVIATION was selected by USAF to install RADS-XXL firefighting systems on the seven C-130Hs for CAL FIRE.

FRENCH MINISTRY OF DEFENSE decided to move forward with Sigint program to replace two existing Transall C-160 Gabriels with three modified Falcon 8Xs.

LAX handled 7.19m pax in October, down 0.9% vs Oct 2018; cargo fell 6.6%.

LONDON GATWICK handled 26.6m pax in six months ended Sep 30, up 0.2% vs a year ago; it posted EBITDA of £350.6m (up 7.9%) on 5.6% higher revenues.

ACI reports year-over-year global pax traffic growth of 2.6% for September.

FASTJET TANZANIA was declared insolvent by the Tanzanian government.

AIR WISCONSIN finalized new 3-year contract with its pilots.

AIR BP signed technical services agreement with Sonangol (state-owned oil company in Angola) to help ensure its operations meet international

WEST STAR AVIATION completed custom paint job on its first Praetor 600.

THE GILL CORPORATION was recertified to AS9100D for quality management.

RAISBECK ENGINEERING has FAA STC for its composite five-blade swept propeller for Beechcraft King Air 200 series; deliveries start in December.

KELLSTROM DEFENSE has acquired AIRBORNE TECHNOLOGIES (ATI), Camarillo, CA (licensed part manufacturer of complex defense aircraft parts).

THALES unveiled Pureflyt flight management system to manage aircraft in connected aerospace ecosystem and increasingly crowded skies from 2024.