General Electric said Singapore Airlines signed a 10-year OnPoint Solutions service agreement for maintenance, overhaul and repair of the GE90-115Bs that will power 19 777-300ERs entering service in 2006. The OnPoint Solutions agreement is the first for the GE90.
United Airlines' United Services MRO division said it formed "a first-of-its-kind strategic network" with four fixed-base operators--Executive Air, JET Aircraft Maintenance, Jett Care and Pegasus Aircraft Maintenance--to expand its line maintenance capabilities from 31 airports currently to more than 50 worldwide.
Japan Airlines Group said international passenger boardings for the 31-day Japanese summer vacation period July 22-Aug. 21 slipped 0.9% compared to the year-ago period to 684,956. Load factor was 73.4%. Demand on transpacific, Korean and Oceania routes was strong but traffic to resort destinations in Southeast Asia was below last year, "reflecting the slow recovery of Japanese traffic" since the tsunami. Traffic to China also was down on 2004 "owing to the lingering effect of anti-Japanese demonstrations" last April.
SkyTeam introduced a corporate travel program under which customers who contract with the alliance will receive discounts for increased business with alliance carriers. Individual travelers will earn miles on the member airline of their choice redeemable on other partners. Corporate travel buyers will have the ability to work with one key airline contact to manage the agreement on behalf of the alliance.
United Airlines and TAP Portugal will codeshare on their transatlantic flights "offering customers a variety of travel options between the US and Portugal through Newark, London Heathrow, Frankfurt, Munich, Amsterdam, Brussels and Zurich." The codeshare will give United passengers access to the Portuguese cities of Lisbon, Faro, Porto and Madeira and in Africa Sal, Dakar and Maputo. Both carriers are members of the Star Alliance.
State-owned Garuda Indonesia and domestic operator Merpati are to be merged and bailed out by the Indonesian government, it appears. Garuda has debts of $830 million and lost $85 million in 2004. A proposal is being worked up to be presented to the government shortly.
News from Travel Technology Update: Garber Travel became the first travel agency to deploy ITA Software's alternative distribution system. The Chestnut Hill, Mass.-based agency, one of the top 25 in the U.S. (its 2003 sales totaled $334 million) is funneling about "10 or 20" United Airlines bookings a week through the system, executive vice president Joan Kaplan said. "We hope to get it up to 50 or 100," she said. United was selected because it is a preferred partner of the agency, Kaplan said.
Component Control announced an agreement with Aeroxchange, an e-business solutions provider, whereby both entities will begin design and implementation of a seamless interface between Component Control's aviation enterprise resource planning software products and Aeroxchange's e-procurement product modules. Blue Sky Network announced the release of SkyRouter, "an interactive Web portal for tracking transportation assets anywhere on earth."
Berlin's International Aerospace Exhibition ILA and Russian air show MAKS announced an MOU outlining future cooperation to promote each other's events. The agreement between the German Aerospace Industries Assn. and the Russian Federation's Federal Agency for Industry was signed at last week's Moscow air show. ILA2006 will take place May 16-21, 2006.
US Dept. of Justice, in comments filed with the US Dept. of Transportation last week, opposed the granting of antitrust immunity to Northwest and Delta Air Lines and Alitalia, KLM, Air France and Czech Airlines, all of whom are members of SkyTeam, citing a "significant risk that the requested immunity would reduce competition on certain international routes" while arguing that the "claimed benefits are modest."
Garber Travel became the first travel agency to deploy ITA Software's alternative distribution system. The Chestnut Hill, Mass.-based agency, one of the top 25 in the U.S. (its 2003 sales totaled $334 million) is funneling about "10 or 20" United Airlines bookings a week through the system, executive vice president Joan Kaplan said. "We hope to get it up to 50 or 100," she said.
China appears to be pulling out all stops to assist Taiwan's airlines, which are seeking overflight rights to cut fuel costs. CAAC told China Daily that it "will handle the applications as soon as possible." The Taiwan government announced in early August that it would allow the country's airlines apply for the rights.
British Airways said it will resume serving hot meals to customers departing London Heathrow on long-haul flights today, while hot meals will be offered to long-haul inbound passengers beginning Wednesday. Customers in the first class and Club World cabins will have three hot meal choices and a deli box option, while World Traveler and World Traveler Plus customers may select from two hot meal options and a deli bag offering. A limited bar service is being offered as well.
Latin America Airline Assn. said its 22 members flew 9.57 billion RPKs in June, up 11.2% compared to the year-ago period, on a 9.2% rise in capacity to 13.91 billion ASKs. Load factor gained 1.2 points to 68.8%. The airlines carried 6.1 million passengers, up 13.8% over June 2004. Growth was fueled by the traffic increase on intra-Latin America routes, where 1.1 million passengers were carried, up 26.7%. Domestic and North American traffic rose 10.9% and 9.3% respectively.
Singapore Airlines' traffic continues to grow, with the carrier recording a 6.9% lift in passengers and a 9.7% increase in cargo for July. Traffic rose 7.2% while capacity grew 6.8% for an overall load factor lift of 0.3 point to 69.1%. Strongest passenger load factor was to the Americas at 88.1%, while Europe had the highest cargo load factor at 69.5%. During the month, SIA introduced passenger flights to Ahmedabad and Amritsar and cargo flights to Johannesburg.
Connexion by Boeing named Lianne Stein VP-Commercial Aviation Business, succeeding Stan Deal, who was named VP-sales and marketing operations at Boeing Commercial Airplanes. Stein most recently served as VP of BCA for Washington operations. Prior to joining Boeing in 2001, she spent 10 years at ILFC. Earlier she was with Flying Tigers.
US Airways received bankruptcy court approval to sell four of its 767s and one spare engine to Mountain Capital Partners LLC, an affiliate of Goldman Sachs, as part of a sale/leaseback agreement. The deal will provide the carrier with $30.8 million initially and another $10 million after recurrent maintenance checks through 2009. US Airways said it has been operating under a month-to-month agreement with Mountain Capital enabling it to return planes and the spare engine as it takes delivery of new aircraft.
China Airlines revised its financial forecast for the 2005 year, telling the markets that it is increasing its operating revenue prediction by 5.8% to TWD$111.69 billion ($3.48 billion) but downgrading its profit forecast from TWD$4.4 billion to TWD$3.08 billion. The airline recorded a 17% growth in passenger revenue and a 12% lift in cargo for the first six months.
Lufthansa Systems said Mexicana will use its ProfitLine/Price module to support its pricing analysis and decision-making. Mexicana will be using LHS as an ASP. LAN Airlines recently signed an agreement with Teradata, a division of NCR Corp., to expand its data warehouse to 4 terabytes. In addition, the agreement includes training on the latest Teradata enterprise data warehouse platform.
Northwest Airlines appeared to come through the first day of a strike by its 4,400 mechanics and aircraft cleaners with flying colors, operating most of its flights on Saturday and achieving a 57.8% ontime departure rate and 97.9% outbound completion factor through 5:15 p.m. EDT, according to an analysis by JP Morgan analyst Jamie Baker. To ease the burden on the mix of replacement workers and third-party providers who are filling in, the airline began flying its fall schedule Friday, operating around 300 fewer daily flights than during the peak summer season.
AirTran Holdings filed a shelf registration with the US Securities and Exchange Commission covering the sale of up to $225 million of its debt securities, preferred stock, common stock or warrants to purchase any of these securities.
Aviapartner will provide catering in Brussels to Continental Airlines for its daily 767-400 service under a five-year contract that begins Jan. 1. Aviapartner valued the deal at €2.2 million ($2.7 million) annually.
Northwest Airlines said it received and rejected a contract proposal from the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Assn. Wednesday evening. It said the offer "appears to fall short of the $176 million in annual cost savings that the company needs from its AMFA-represented employees." NWA valued the proposal at $100 million annually "and only for a two-year period." AMFA employees will be free to strike the airline upon expiration of a federally mandated 30-day cooling-off period at 12:01 a.m. Aug. 20.
Estonian Air, which is 49% owned by SAS, reported a profit of EEK17.7 million ($1.39 million) in the first half of 2005 compared to a loss of EEK1.1 million in the year-ago period. First-half operating revenue grew 13% to EEK494.1 million on a 20.2% rise in passengers to 293,700. Load factor improved 3.4 points to 61.9%. Despite a 68% jump in fuel price, the carrier slashed its cost per ASK by 12.3% compared to 2004.
