EasyJet has partnered with Virgin Atlantic Airways for connections at its London Gatwick base, giving passengers on mainland Europe easy access to routes across the Atlantic. Connecting with Virgin flights will open up destinations including Las Vegas, Orlando, Antigua and St. Lucia, the carriers said Tuesday. Similar agreements are already in place with the likes of Norwegian Air Shuttle, WestJet and SIA. EasyJet is using its network of centrally located airports across Europe to offer the connectivity that has typically been a burden for legacy airlines. Flag carriers have often incurred losses from running short flights designed to fill their more profitable long-haul routes. The airline is expecting to pen further deals with Mideast carriers and competitors in the Far East before the end of this year, it said Tuesday. <br/>
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The CAA has said it will not intervene to bring UK passengers home following the collapse of Primera Air, which has left thousands of people stranded abroad and holiday plans ruined. The CAA said it was not obliged to mount an operation because the airline was not covered by its Atol protection scheme. The regulator said passengers who had already flown would have to make their own arrangements to return home and should contact their insurer or travel agent for assistance. A spokesman said the regulator was trying to ascertain the number of UK passengers affected. An airlines analyst at Moody’s said Primera Air’s collapse was “yet more evidence of the challenges faced by European airlines, namely strong competition and increasing fuel prices". <br/>
JetBlue does not expect to see tangible bottom-line results from its newly announced version of no-frills fares until late 2019, a top executive acknowledged. “With respect to the earnings accretion, we’ll start seeing it at the very end of 2019, but will really start rolling in, in 2020,” EVP Marty St. George said Tuesday. The timeline’s main driver is getting the IT systems modified to offer the wider range of fares and broadening ancillary-revenue options, St. George explained. “Fully unlocking the value of segmentation, in our view, is going to require changes and improvements in how we price and distribute our product,” he said. “We’re starting upstream on this process...[and] also spending a lot of time on new revenue management tools that will better match price to willingness to pay on a customer level”. <br/>
JetBlue Airways stuck in its third straight year lagging the airline industry’s share returns, is looking to boost earnings by expanding in 3 key cities and selling more travel services such as car rentals and hotels. The carrier will shift more flights to Boston and Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and add more seats at New York JFK. It will step up efforts to improve on-time performance, which also trails the industry, while adding more seats on some planes. JetBlue is also banking on a renegotiated maintenance contract to help lower costs and improve margins. The plan, outlined Tuesday, represents a new push by the carrier to broaden revenue sources while trying to contain rising costs from pricier fuel and new and pending labour contracts. The initiatives should result in earnings per share of as much as $3 in 2020, the company said. <br/>
In broad terms, recent strikes at Ryanair could cost the airline up to E120m. The carrier warned Monday that profits for its full financial year, which ends March 31st, 2019, would be between E1.1b and E1.2b instead of the E1.25b to E1.35b that it originally guided. Higher fuel costs are likely to account for E30m of the fall in profit, implying up to E120m for the fallout from the strikes that have hit operations here and in Europe over the summer. That includes the cost of reaccommodating or refunding customers as well as lower fares, resulting from the airline cutting prices to lure consumers who may be put off booking flights with Ryanair because they fear a strike will cancel the service. The figures exclude the near E150m once-off hit that Ryanair will take on the start-up losses at Laudamotion. <br/>
The Moldovan govt says loss-making Air Moldova has been sold to a Romanian group for MDL1.2b (US$71m.) The Public Property Agency said Tuesday that Civil Aviation Group paid $2.96m to Moldova's state budget. The remaining money from the purchase will go toward covering debts that were sold to prevent the airline's bankruptcy. Air Moldova was founded in 1983 and has flights to 33 destinations. The group said it would keep Air Moldova's status as the national airline. The new owners also plan to launch 7 new routes next year and 4 more in 2020. The Civil Aviation Group includes Romanian low-cost airline Blue Air and two Moldovan associates. One is co-owner of AMS Airlines, an air cargo company in Georgia. <br/>
Emirates is focused on organic growth and remains averse to expanding through acquisitions, an executive said, repeating a denial that the airline is in talks to take over the airline arm of unprofitable neighbour Etihad. “Sure we want to lift synergies and create more efficiencies, but that is not a merger,” Hubert Frach, Emirates’ head of commercial operations for the Americas and Europe, said Monday. “DNA-wise we come from a completely different angle. The key success formula for Emirates is organic growth." "It gives us the speed, independence and agility," Frach said. "It’s not so much partnership, it’s not so much forming alliances.” It was reported that Emirates was exploring a deal with Etihad to make it the world’s No. 1 by passenger traffic “There is no truth to it,” Frach said. “Zero truth.” <br/>
UK airlines urgently want answers from the UK govt about the potential challenges the industry could face post Brexit, the CE of one of Europe’s largest regional airlines has said. Christine Ourmières-Widener said the UK aviation sector has been forced to adopt a holding position as it waits to see if there will be a soft or hard Brexit landing, against the backdrop of fresh warnings from the president of the EC, Jean-Claude Juncker, that in the event of a no-deal scenario British planes may not be able to land on the European continent. The CE of Flybe, which operates flights from Belfast, Dublin and Cork, said airlines need clarity to plan for the future as Brexit could create significant financial and operational challenges." We are a highly regulated industry but if something changes then we need to be able to adapt," she said. <br/>
The FAA has proposed a US$474,000 civil penalty against Frontier Airlines, alleging the company operated hundreds of flights without required medical supplies. The agency alleges Frontier employees installed emergency medical kits on 11 airplanes lacking either injectable epinephrine, atropine or both. The FAA alleges the airline was made aware July 10, 2017, that its aircraft contained defective emergency medical kits. The next day, Frontier applied for an exemption to allow the airline to continue flying with the medical kits on a temporary basis. FAA granted the exemption Sept 16, 2017. But the FAA alleges the airline operated those 11 aircraft during 787 revenue flights from July 11 to July 27, 2017—after it had become aware of the deficient medical kits, but before the FAA had issued the exemption. <br/>