Short Takes
April 27th 2015
AIRLINES: India’s Jet Airways is exploring both an outright sale and a sale-lease-back of its ten B777-300ERs and twelve A330-200s “to drive sustainable profitability”. Read More » All Nippon Airways (ANA) has teamed up with Toyota Boshoku Corporation to develop a new generation of domestic economy class seats which will be introduced on domestic flights from June. By fiscal 2016, ANA plans to have installed a total of 1,560 seats across six B767-300 aircraft.
AIRPORTS: From July, Changi Airport Group will reduce the transfer and transit passenger service charge from the current S$9 ($6.75) to S$3. Franchise fees for ground handlers will be reduced by 20%. Terminal 3 at Tokyo Narita International Airport has begun operations, with the facility now welcoming a growing number of low-cost carriers including Vanilla Air, Jeju Air, Jetstar Japan, Jetstar Airways and Spring Airlines.
CODESHARES: Malaysia Airlines will place its ‘MH’ code on Etihad Airways’ services from Abu Dhabi to Dammam, and Abu Dhabi to Riyadh, starting April 30. KLM has added its ‘KL’ designator to Air France’s services from Paris’ CDG to Beijing, Guangzhou and Shanghai (PVG), respectively. Korean Air has placed its ‘KE’ code on all of China Airlines’ services from Taipei (TPE) to Incheon, as well as TPE to Busan and Kaohsiung to Incheon.
ROUTES: Air China will launch a twice-weekly Wuhan – Surat Thani A320 service starting April 30. Air New Zealand will replace the B767 with the B787-9 on the five-weekly Auckland – Nadi route beginning November 27. Asiana Airlines will operate a weekly A320 Busan – Qiqihar A320 charter from May 21 through to July 9, as well as a twice-weekly B777-200ER Incheon – Venice charter service from May 26 through to June 26. Azerbaijan Airlines has started deploying the B787-8 five times a week on the Baku – Heathrow route. Beijing Capital Airlines has launched a four-weekly Guiyang – Bangkok (BKK) A320 service. British Airways will deploy the A380 daily on the Singapore – Heathrow route starting December 14. China Airlines will launch a four-weekly Taipei (TPE) – Wuxi B737-800 service from June 16. Etihad Airways will add a four-weekly Abu Dhabi – Madrid A330-200 service beginning June 2. Indonesia AirAsia has launched a daily Denpasar – Bangkok (DMK) A320 service (in addition to Thai AirAsia’s daily rotation). Malaysia Airlines will terminate its five-weekly Kuala Lumpur – Frankfurt B777-200ER route from May 29 after almost 40 years of operations. Qantas Airways will re-launch the Perth – Singapore route with five-weekly B737-800 operations from June 26. Qatar Airways will reduce frequency on the Doha – Amsterdam B787 route from daily to six-weekly from June 16. From May 11, Turkish Airlines will increase frequency on the Istanbul – Varna A319 route from daily to eleven-weekly.
TRAFFIC DATA: IATA said February year-on-year premium passenger growth occurred primarily on routes within the Far East (up 12.2%), transatlantic routes (up 11.7%), Far East-Southwest Pacific routes (up 7.8%) and, at 6.2% growth each, Europe-Middle East routes and Middle East-Far East routes. Premium travel within Africa fell 14.3%, while Europe-Africa premium traffic was down 7.4%. Premium travel within Europe, and within North America, grew just 0.4% and 0.8%, respectively.
ENGINES: Air New Zealand has selected Pratt & Whitney’s PW1100G geared turbofan engines for its order of 10 A320neos and three A321neos.
