November 2006 Archives

Gary Rogliano, who led all-business class Maxjet into the high-end transatlantic luxury airline wars, left the year-old Washington Dulles-based carrier after an apparent dust up with his board of directors. The airline said he was "leaving to pursue other opportunities", which is press release for "shown the door".

Rogliano left shortly after the carrier began flying its 102-seat Boeing 767s between London Stansted and Las Vegas. That was its third route after New York JFK and Washington Dulles routes to and from Stansted, and the Las Vegas flight is reportedly doing box-office business. But the market is getting more crowded with a UK-based entrant, SilverJet, planning to start up next year, as well as an French all-business carrier, Elysair, also eyeing an early 2007 start.

Eos, offering all sleeping seats, began on the same week as Maxjet, and now plans an expansion with a new $75 million infusion of capital that will let it buy new Boeing 757s to convert into its 48-seat configuration.

The Maxjet marketing and selling point was "affordable luxury", which it defines as an almost lie-flat seat in an all business-class aircraft. Eos, by contrast, has full beds in small, enclosed sections. Competition in the market, though, has made fares competitive in this niche segment, chipping away slightly at the Maxjet advantage.

Taking Rogliano's place as president and chief executive is Bill Stockbridge, its chairman and one of its founders. A veteran of the air cargo industry, Stockbridge is a member of the Richmond, Virginia, group of wealthy investors who started Maxjet.

Read our chief executive interview with Rogliano.

Cancun, Mexico's fast growing tourist mecca, is half a world away from the development miracle of Dubai but they have a similar buzz: the buzz of commerce, construction and fun.
The Airline Business team are here in Cancun publishing a daily newspaper at the Latin American Airline Leaders Forum. Driving from the airport - an efficient gateway run by private company ASUR - there are rows of hotels facing the Caribbean Sea, and many more being built.
Construction is happening everywhere, night and day, just like Dubai and neighbours Abu Dhabi and Doha. Cancun epitomises the economic vibrancy of Mexico, and as such is the ideal venue for the Latin American Airline Association's annual meeting.
From tomorrow - 30 November - the ALTA Airline Business dailies will be available to read on the Flight Global website.

EasyJet is moving further away from the pure no-frills model with an initiative to enable passengers to pay an extra fee for early boarding.
Dubbed the "Speedy boarding" initiative, the first 20 passengers making an online booking are given the option of paying between ｣2.50 ($4.90) and ｣7.50 to board the aircraft ahead of other passengers, whatever time they arrive at check-in.
EasyJet tested the concept on several routes out of London Luton Airport earlier this year and has now announced it is extending the initiative, although it says the option is not available from all airports.
It also points out that where passengers are bussed to the aircraft, it cannot guarantee that passengers who have opted to take up the initiative will be first off the bus - conjuring up images of infuriated "Speedy Boarders" pushing old ladies out of the way in their haste to take up their rightful places in the choicest seats. "Where bussing is frequent on a particular route, this is reflected in the Speedy Boarding price you pay," says the carrier.
The price will also vary depending on the length of the flight.
Concepts like this, as well as online check-in, which was first introduced in February, and the Early Bird transfer of passengers who arrive in time to catch an earlier departure are clearly aimed at the business traveller and it is here that easyJet sees a way to help boost profitability.
"Business travellers tend to pay more because they book later," says Andrew Harrison, easyJet chief executive, "so we don't need to shift the mix very much to have an impact on profitability.

Qatar Airways, which operates Doha International Airport, has built its first and business class passengers a shiny new terminal.
It offers a range of services to pamper premium passengers - from duty free shopping, restaurants and spa treatments, sauna and jacuzzi to conference rooms and secretarial services.
Let's not forget the children and nanny who will be travelling at the back of the aircraft - they too can check in at the terminal and use selected areas, including a play area and nursery.
Any medical concerns can be swiftly dealt with before embarkation too - there is a doctor and nurse on duty in a fully manned medical centre.
Dedicated check-in facilities, concierge meet and greet services, fast-track security and five dedicated boarding gates should all ensure a stress-free passage through the terminal.
The facility, which was opened on 27 November, was built as part of  $200 million expansion at the airport to support the ambitious growth plans of its home carrier. Qatar Airways is by far the largest operator using the airport, operating some 90% of flights in and out of Doha. The carrier has 20 Boeing 777s on order and is still planning a large order for Airbus A350s once the final configuration of the aircraft is known.

The Airline Business leader in our December issue was entitled "Merger mania" on the back of the move by US Airways to acquire Delta Air Lines. Just days after the magazine came out two other potential deals have been aired: a takeover of Australia's Qantas by a partnership of Macquarie Bank and the Texas Pacific Group private equity firm; and more talks between Air France-KLM about the Franco-Dutch carrier possibly taking over troubled Alitalia.

What is puzzling about the Qantas approach is that it includes Texas Pacific, which has successfully invested in Continental, America West, Ryanair and Tiger Airways. At the IATA Annual General Meeting in June its founding partner, David Bonderman questioned the wisdom of going anywhere near an industry that was past the peak as far as the cycle goes. "It's time to sell ladies and gentlemen," he said.

So now it's time to buy is it David? So what has changed your mind? Perhaps the industry is, after all, headed for a soft landing and the doomsayers are getting less gloomy.

Buying Alitalia has many more pitfalls, so don't expect this story to run anywhere as close as the Qantas one. Still Air-France-KLM is the logical partner in many ways for Alitalia and its board would be remiss if it didn't take another close look at whether a partnership could finally work.

Don't expect these moves to be the last of the merger plays as the takeover market starts to hype up.

Looking none the worse for recent heart surgery, Airbus chief salesman John Leahy was in London today (22 November) launching the European manufacturer's Global Market Forecast, it's first for two years.
Just as our recent blog with Qatar Airways chief executive Akbar Al Baker showed, Leahy is a quote machine. So here are the highlights from his packed press conference, which did, as my colleague from Flight International Max Kingsley-Jones observed, start 20 minutes late. Typical Airbus we commented dryly.
1. Leahy didn't shy away from the obvious: Airbus has had a bad year. Or has it really been that bad? Leahy observed that despite the "absolute mess Airbus is in in 2006", it will still end up being its second best ever sales performance. Current sales stand at 619 aircraft, compared to the record-setting level of 1,111 in 2005. "This surprised a lot of people in Toulouse when I mentioned it...It has been one of the best of years as well as one of the worst of years," he said.
2. Market share. Leahy's target in order terms is to keep in the 40-60% band. This year after five ahead of Boeing, Airbus will most likely fall behind again. It has 43% of the year's orders now, in unit, terms, and around 35-37% of orders by value. "In terms of deliveries it is our best ever year - we will deliver 425 aircraft."
3. A380 compensation. Asked (by me actually) if Airbus was setting an industry record for airline compensation levels on a single programme with the A380 Leahy had a straight reply: "I wouldn't know if we are setting new records. What I do know is the compensation is reasonable in many cases," he said, adding that in most cases it is capped.
4. A380 cancellations. Despite three delays to the A380, Leahy does not expect any more cancellations after FedEx chopped its A380 freigher order. Customers "get mad, but they don't talk about cancellations, they are talking about compensation...all the others are staying with us". And, in fact, carriers like Qantas, Singapore Airlines and others are talking about how many more they are buying, he said.
5. Low-cost A380. After evacuation tests that got 853 people and 20 crew off the A380, Leahy is only half-joking about the super jumbo as a real people-mover. The success of the test means "I've got to update my brochures," he said, when asked if low-cost carriers might be interested in the aircraft. Leahy revealed he was talking to a carrier interested in the A330 that afternoon that had also asked for a idea of the A380 in a low-cost configuration.
6. A350 launch. Wait for the EADS board meeting, said Leahy. But: "I've been pleasantly surprised by the fact of how many of our customers are willing to wait for it (the A350). It has slowed sales for our competitor," he said, referring of course to Boeing's 787.
7. Salesmanship. Asked if sorting out the A380 issues was taking up most of his time, Leahy replied "too much!" He is currently spending about 50% of his energy on the A380 and the rest on new aircraft sales. However, the A380 talks have had some spin-off benefits: "Part of sorting out the A380's problems is producing new sales."

Caribbean Airlines chief exec Peter Davies is drawing inspiration for himself and his staff in the run up to launching the new carrier in the New Year from an old British railway company motto: "The passenger is our business, not an interruption to our service", was used by a rail provider in 1930s, explains Davies.
The transfer from British West Indies Airways to Caribbean Airlines is going well, says Davies, but the deal has not gone without facing plenty of stick in the Caribbean. According to Davies, about 30% of the people applying to work for Caribbean Airlines are ex-BWIA staff, with the rest being new. "That's encouraging," says Davies.
As the queues form to work for this new Trinidad-based carrier, Davies is turning to another old-fashioned technique to help ticket sales: open a shop. With internet booking levels low in the Caribbean, Davies is planning to open up to six internet cafes in Trinidad & Tobago to encourage travellers to come and book their flights online. "We want to hit the market very hard," he says.

The bold move to create Caribbean Airlines out of the ashes of serial loss-maker British West Indies Airways (BWIA) took another step today with the announcement that the new carrier (launches 1 January) will axe its daily service between its Trinidad & Tobago base and London Heathrow.
The Airbus A340 route has been a flagship link for BWIA but has been leaking cash. Chief executive Peter Davies has negotiated a deal with British Airways to continue the service, with BA flying on from Barbados three times a week from Gatwick. This arrangement begins from the summer schedule from 27 March. The carriers will codeshare on the route.
All pretty routine stuff from a business point of view, albeit a controversial move for BWIA/Caribbean Airlines, as the Caribbean governments treasure their international connections. Which explains the Caribbean Airlines press release, entitled: Caribbean Airlines to start new service to London.
What? Technically, yes, Caribbean is gaining access to a new airport (Gatwick) via another carrier, but the key part of the deal has been to persuade BA to take on the route and for Caribbean to stop flying across the atlantic.
Actually that wasn't all that hard a decision for BA because the deal came with a serious sweetener - the chance for BA to buy three weekly slots pairs from Caribbean Airline. A slot pair at this congested airport can fetch around $10 million.
Heathrow is the second international route the airline has axed, following the cessation of Washington Dulles services in October.

The youthful, or at least soon-to-be formerly youthful Doug Parker (45) has always been an upbeat kind of fellow, and his optimism held him steer America West through its own troubles and into a merger with US Airways that has by all accounts been a strong success. Now Parker is attempting to smile his way through an even bigger deal: his unsolicited $8 billion offer to merge with Delta, a deal which, if completed, would likely create the world's largest carrier once Delta comes out of bankruptcy reorganisation. US Airways, the new name for the merged America West/US Airways, was formed just 14 months ago, but now offers $4 billion in cash and $4 billion in US Airways stock to Delta's unsecured creditors. Parker, who says he has the money lined up, says the 2005 merger created one of the industry's best-performing airlines, largely because the old US Airways had the opportunity to reduce costs and capacity by using its bankruptcy powers to rid itself of aircraft leases.

"Our timing is driven by fact that Delta is in bankruptcy, a unique opportunity to realize value", he said, promising that a merger would generate $1.65 billion in annual savings and benefits. "There are not many industries more fragmented then the one we participate in. In an industry this fragmented, we think there are opportunities for mergers". More than half of the savings would be lost if Delta emerges from bankruptcy as a stand-alone carrier, because it would then have lost the power to reject leases and cut other costs under bankruptcy law, he said.

But some of the airline securities analysts on a conference call with Parker were outright sceptical, citing antitrust, labour, financial, and fleet-compatibility issues. Ray Neidl, the Calyon Securities analyst who has been eagerly predicting industry consolidation, put the chances of the deal going through in the 35-40% range, citing likely obstacles in Washington. While most analysts speculate about a possible chain-reaction consolidation wave, Neidl also cautioned that the bid increases uncertainty for the regional airline group overall. A deal "could put the growth outlook for new 76-seat flying with the regionals at risk. New management could halt the proposal for 50 incremental 76-seat aircraft that Delta has sent out", he says. And a combined carrier could shrink hubs at Cincinnati and so harm Comair, and also hurt Charlotte (Mesa and others), Philadelphia (Mesa and others) and Salt Lake City (SkyWest).

But Parker thinks it can be done and he thinks that opportunities for savings dwarf the downside. He makes a detailed case for the savings in a presentation shown to analysts in the webcast and conference call. US Airways has made available a slide show outlining the benefits, and has also posted correspondence between Parker and Delta CEO Jerry Grinstein about the bid. Download the US Airways slide show: investor presentation, a letter from US Airways to Delta, and a response from Delta to US Airways.

It was inevitable that safety became a topic of heated discussions during November's Annual General Assembly of the African Airlines Association (AFRAA) in Cairo. While it is true that cold statistics clearly show the safety record among airlines on the continent to be considerably worse than that in other, more developed regions of the world, airline chiefs insist that this creates an entirely false picture.

Their ire is directed particularly at the European Union (EU) whose blacklist of nearly 100 African airlines has caused consternation and has been detrimental to the air transport industry, and the loss of income incalculable.

The countries with the greatest number on the banned list for flying into the EU - Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Sierra Leone - said AFRAA secretary general Christian Folly-Kossi are "tarnishing the whole of Africa, creating an [undeserved] perception that safety on the whole continent is poor". Furthermore, said another leader, "most of these airlines are not even owned or managed by Africans, and it is governments that must get a grip on licensing".

No one disputes that airport and air navigation infrastructure is badly in need of upgrading and that more modern aircraft have to be introduced. But, says Gabriel Gbenga Olowo, executive director at Nigeria's Bellview Airlines, it is wrong to suggest that ageing aircraft are to blame for the poor safety record.

Not one of the major accident investigations has found any technical fault with the aircraft, he insists, adding that "the real problem is the human factor". Airlines have inherited pilots and maintenance staff from the largely unregulated early days of a fledgling industry, from the failed Nigeria Airways and Air Afrique and others.

"Old pilots and engineers are complacent and unwilling to adapt to new methods and technology," he says, "we need to train a younger generation of pilots and engineers, but it will take time."

In spite of the negative publicity about safety standards in Africa, there are encouraging signs of progress. The more established carriers are engaging in IATA's six-point Operational Safety Audit (IOSA). Five African airlines have already passed IOSA, three more have been audited, another eight have contracted for an audit, and 11 more are currently in negotiation with one or more audit organisations.
IOSA, says Air Mauritius chairman Sanjay Bhuckory, should be seen as a "certificate of morality".

British Airways chose the centre of one of its main customer bases - London's Docklands close to the financial heartland of the UK - as the venue to launch its new Club World business class.
BA is following hard on the heels of Singapore Airlines and Cathay Pacific in unveiling its next generation business class flat bed. For chief executive Willie Walsh, five years after the carrier "revolutionized" the industry with the first flat bed, "now is the time for BA to take a decisive step forward".
The ｣100 million ($190 million) investment sees BA keeping its patented "ying yang" arrangement where half the seats face backwards. The bed is 25% wider and there is a new privacy screen and on-demand in-flight entertainment system.
The roll-out of the new Club World will take 18 months with the first aircraft in service at the end of November. Only Boeing 777s and 747-400s are slated to receive the upgraded beds for now.
As part of the roll-out BA is increasing the number of business class seats from the 38 today to 52 in 31 of its 747-400s. This will produce an extra 8% more business class capacity.

There is nothing better the Qatar Airways chief Akbar Al Baker likes to do, it seems, is spar with the press.
He was positively beaming as he took his seat at the airline's annual press conference at World Travel Market in London the other day. The room was packed, for Al Baker is good value. He says stuff: Often controversial stuff.
But what's this, he starts with an apology. He had promised last year that his airline would launch 10 destinations during 2006. It didn't, it only launched one (in March it kicked off a daily service between its Doha hub and Hong Kong).
The reason was because "of protracted negotiations with Boeing and Airbus for our next aircraft order", said Al Baker. Those negotiations were fruitless and Qatar could not get its hands on the airliners to launch its new routes.
That will all change in 2007 as all four of its A340-600s come into service and first of 20 777s start flying towards the end of the year.
Now what: green taxes? Al Baker is not in favour. He favours putting collection boxes at airports so that people can contribute voluntarily. "The biggest polluters are countries that have a total disregard (for climate change)," he says.
Also, he believes, green campaigners should look harder at those dirty military fast jets rather than bleating on about the more fuel-efficient civil airliners. I felt the PR team wince at that one.
Next: low-cost carriers in the Middle East. Now Al Baker's been asked that one a few times before. "I'll have to record my answer," he says, and play it back the next time. The answer is that low-cost carriers are a no-no for Al Baker in his region. A lack of market access and strong passenger demands to carry a lot of luggage are just two good reasons why it won't work.
What about access to Australia? Unfortunately not yet, he says resignedly. "Australian carriers are very troubled by competition from Middle Eastern carriers. We are being restricted by the government of Australia which is putting up unacceptable hurdles."
The way out question. Sometimes at press conferences you get a question from the left field. Al Baker's came from a journalist determined to pin him down about a recent trip he had made with Qatar. The vegetarian meal he had ordered did not come, there was some sort of delay at Singapore Changi that was down to Qatar and his application for a frequent flyer card had not been processed.
Al Baker took this in his stride, apologizing and promising to look into these matters. In fact, his commercial general manager, Peter Spencer, who was also on the podium, took the chance to e-mail Doha HQ and find some answers while the conference continued. Later he passed the reply back to Al Baker. His boss could reply right away to the miffed journalist, at least on one point. The answer: he had not filled in the application properly - no address was supplied. Oh no, said the scribe, I did fill it out. Puzzled looks all round.
Al Baker turns to Spencer, who is confident his team has unearthed the errant form, and says it will all be checked, and adds: "If he's giving you the wrong information, you know what happens!" We all snigger in jest, for Al Baker is alluding to his reputation of something of a tough task master. We all know however that he is only half joking.
Roll on the next Qatar Airways press conference. They are top value.

How long does it take to design and build an airport?

If you ask an airport operator in Europe, North America or Japan, most will tell you 10 to 20 years. But if you ask the airport operator in South Africa, it claims only three years. And it is serious.

South Africa does not plan to even select a consortium to design and build the new Durban International Airport until early next year. But the Airports Company of South Africa (ACSA) is committed to opening the airport prior to the 2010 World Cup, which will be staged in South Africa.

To a journalist who has reported on the delays experienced by several new airports including most recently Bangkok, building a new airport in only three years seems impossible. So while attending the Airports Council International (ACI) world annual general assembly this week in Cape Town, I challenged South African transport minister Jeff Radebe and ACSA chief executive Monhla Hlahla by asking them if their schedule for Durban International was really realistic.

"We're on track," insists Radebe.

Hlahla acknowledges "there's always a risk there will be a delay" but insists an airport can be built in two to three years. South Africa does not have most of the obstacles, including environmental, that Europe or other regions face, she says.

ACSA group executive for aviation services John Neville says one of two local consortiums, which submitted their combined design-build bids at the end of last month, will be selected by the end of the first quarter of 2007. Construction will begin in April and conclude at the end of 2009. After a simulation exercise the airport will open by the end of the first quarter of 2010, Neville says.

But funding for the project, which will cost an estimated 3 to 4 billion rand ($413 to $552 million), has not yet been committed. Environmental approval also has not yet been secured. Both of these obstacles, which in other countries can hold up new airport construction for several years, are expected to be cleared by year-end.

The new airport will initially handle up to 7.5 million passengers per year with 13 gates but can later be expanded to handle up to 45 million passengers annually. The runway will be long enough to accommodate a fully-loaded Airbus A380 freighter. The current airport, which is South Africa's third largest after Johannesburg and Cape Town, can now handle up to 4 million passengers annually.

It is hard to believe Durban will have a new airport for the 2010 World Cup after hearing during the ACI assembly from Kansai International Airport president Atushi Murayama how it took 20 years to build Kansai. But Durban International was not even the most ambitious airport project discussed during the ACI general assembly this week.

The landlocked Western African country of Burkina Faso is trying to attract a private company to help fund, build and operate a new airport at its capital Ouagadougou, although its current airport only handles 300,000 passengers annually. At least the Burkina Faso transport minister, Gilbert Noel Ouedraogo, and its consultant, Lufthansa Consulting, are realistic about the time it will take to build the new airport. They hope a new airport will open in five years but acknowledge it could take eight to 10 years.

Hungry to share in their carrier's new profit-rich diet, American's pilots have told their employer in no uncertain terms that it needs their okay if it is to begin one of the new routes between the US and China and that American is fighting for. The American bid, which many have tipped as possible winner because DFW would be a new gateway to China, is seen as having an inside track given the political power Texas has with both Republican and Democrat lawmakers. But the pilot wrinkle can't help the application for Beijing rights by American, which made its first flight to China in April when its Flight 289 from Chicago landed in Shanghai.

Within hours of the Allied Pilots Association caution to American, another union at another China-seeking carrier, the Air Line Pilots Association at Northwest, made it very clear that - despite all the pay its and concessions they have had to gave during the Northwest bankruptcy that began in September 2005 - they are ready, willing, and able to take on another China route, this one between Detroit and Shanghai. "Northwest pilots see no operational problems as we have been flying from the US to China since 1947, longer than any other American airline currently flying", said Capt. Dave Stevens, chairman of the Northwest chapter of ALPA.

The US-China route competition has so far been largely positive, although the Business Travel Coalition's Kevin Mitchell was persuaded to come out against the United Airlines bid to fly Beijing to Washington, the so-called 'capital-to-capital route'. United Airlines makes its case here. (Mitchell won't say how he was persuaded.) The other contender is Continental, which wants to link its Newark hub near New York with Shanghai, and which has tried "viral" marketing such as a public march in Lower Manhattan's Chinatown or its public distribution of fortune cookies containing messages in favour of its bid as well as an on-line petition.

New security regulations, in particular a European Commission (EC) restriction on liquids in hand luggage, are the hot topic at this week's Airport Council International (ACI) annual general world assembly in Cape Town.

ACI members approved a resolution today calling for governments to work together to harmonise security restrictions. Specifically, they are urging the EC to ease a new regulation which entered into effect yesterday that prevents passengers from carrying in their hand bags containers with more than 100 millilitres of liquid.

The only exception is if the containers are purchased at airport shops within the EU that are using special tamper proof bags. But ACI members both inside and outside Europe say such an exception is discriminatory against airports outside the EU.

Monhla Hlahla, the chief executive officer of Airports Company South Africa, the host of this year's world assembly, complains the regulation means passengers with connecting flights through European hubs cannot buy duty free buy liquor from South African airports. "It's rendering us a secondary market," she says.

George Muhoho, president of ACI Africa and chief executive officer of Kenya Airports Authority, also says the regulation is discriminating airports in developing countries. "I'm sure it's not intended but you can possibly see it," he says of the discrimination.

Niels Boserup, chairman of ACI and chief executive officer of Copenhagen Airport, says the new regulation is also negatively impacting EU airports because "passengers are bewildered" by the regulations and therefore are not purchasing duty free in Europe as well as well.  "This is a bureaucratic decision," Boserup says. "We are not at all happy about this."

In attempt to revive sales, Copenhagen airport shops are guaranteeing passengers that if their duty free items are confiscated they will be entitled to a full refund. Airports outside the EU cannot make such a guarantee because legally their liquor bottles are being confiscated at EU airports.

For example, passengers from South Africa that have purchased duty free liquor at the Johannesburg airport will have their bottles confiscated by security in Frankfurt if they connect to another flight at Frankfurt or any other EU hub. If their destination is their point of entry in the EU they will be able to keep their liquor, but airports and airlines are finding it difficult to communicate this message to passengers.

"There is a risk that passengers will be confused by the differences between intra-European and international allowances, and they will certainly be frustrated if items are confiscated at security checkpoints," says ACI director general Robert Aaronson. "For concessionaries, it puts duty free sales at a particular disadvantage and any loss in concessionaire sales will in turn reduce critically needed revenues for airports."

ACI is hoping airports are given the opportunity to work together and with other industry stakeholders to come up with new harmonised security regulations, including a regulation on a seal for liquid containers that governments around the world can trust. ACI is concerned if the current EU rule sticks, duty revenues will be reduced worldwide and its members will have no choice but to increase airport charges for airlines.

KLM is celebrating 70 years of the Douglas DC-3 Dakota and has launched a new website which looks back at aviation pioneers to mark the occasion. On 13 November 1936, KLM operated the DC-3 on its first scheduled service. The website celebrates this aeronautical milestone with pictures of Amsterdam Schiphol Airport as it was in the 1930s.
In addition to the Pioneers in Aviation website, celebrations include a re-enactment of the inaugural flight on 13 November to Le Bourget - Paris' main airport in the 1930s. The Salon Aeronautique - now known as the Paris Air Show - was being held in Le Bourget that week.
KLM was the first airline outside of the USA to deploy the Dakota. KLM placed its first order for eight DC-3s in August 1936, to operate flights to the Dutch colonies in the East Indies and on busier European routes.

"We have a very strong compensation clause with a limited excusable delay beyond which Airbus will have to give me loads of money and the aircraft as a gift," said Akbar Al Baker (centre), with only a hint of pathos, speaking at his annual press conference at London's World Travel Market show yesterday about discussions between his airline and Airbus about A380 deliveries.

Over the past few weeks, all the customers of the Airbus A380 have been nagged by journalists over how much the manufacturer is giving airlines for delays to their deliveries. "As far as compensation is concerned we have a very rigid mechanism in our purchase agreement which I cannot disclose," said the head of Qatar Airways.

A press conference held by Al Baker is always an entertaining affair, and his appearance at WTM did not disappoint. Although his central message was to announce his carrier is getting back on its ambitious growth track with a whole load of new route launches next year, after just one (Hong Kong) this year, the hour-long discussion ranged over topics as diverse as the Airbus A380, the environment, passenger service, Australian routes, in-flight catering monopolies, female pilots, Live TV and financial results.

Among the highlights was the clearest indication yet about when Qatar will take its first of the Airbus superjumbos. The airline had already delayed its first delivery from 2007 to 2009 because of delays to the construction of the New Doha International Airport, said Al Baker. Already "disappointed" with a further delay, Qatar now knows it will receive its first A380 in late 2010 and the second in early 2011. Two options will follow a year later if exercised.

The co-operation agreement signed back in July by the UK's bmi and Russia's Transaero to operate a daily codeshare service between London Heathrow and Moscow Domodedovo took off on 29 October.
It has been nine years since bmi first attempted to gain a foothold in the Russian market - the previous attempt ended in failure in 2000. "We've been banging on the Russian door for almost as long as we've been banging on the Open Skies door," says chief executive Nigel Turner.
This is bmi's first foray into the medium-haul market and sees the introduction of a new business-class product on the carrier's Airbus A320, with a 41in seat pitch and improved in-flight service. Transaero will use Boeing 737 aircraft on the route.
Turner says he anticipates the service appealing particularly to business-class passengers, and those working in the energy sector.
This will strike a chord with Transaero, which boasts of operating the world's longest domestic route - 11 hours' duration to Anadyr, capital of the Chukotka region in the far north east of Russia, a rich source of gold, diamonds, gas and oil, and whose governor is Chelsea football club owner Roman Abramovich.

Maxjet, the year-old all-business class carrier that plies its trade across the atlantic, launched its latest service - between London Stansted and Las Vegas - with all the razzmatazz you would expect with the world's gaming and fun capital at one end of the route.

And none other than the King himself was tempted to turn out and endorse the new service.

Maxjet's twice-weekly Boeing 767 service will compete with Virgin Atlantic for travellers wishing to travel directly between London and Las Vegas. Virgin flies daily 747-400s between its Gatwick base and the US city.

Las Vegas becomes Maxjet's third route, adding to those from Stansted to New York JKF and Washington Dulles.

When journalists get invited on inaugural flights to new destinations, they can usually pack shorts and suncream. This week's new route for bmi was a departure in more ways than one -  to the chilly city of Moscow.
Although Moscow is in many aspects just like other major cities, full of teenagers walking the streets with mobile phones clamped to their ears, it felt distinctly alien to me, on my first visit to Russia. The fact that signs everywhere are in the Cyrillic script, which means that you can't even hazard a guess as to what they are saying, all adds to the mystique.

The high spot of the flying visit (no pun intended) for me was walking through Red Square on the way back from dinner in the first snow of the Moscow winter. With the Kremlin on one side, with its red stars glowing on top of its towers, the GUM department store covered in lights like a giant Christmas tree on the other side, and St Basil's Cathedral in front, it was a magical experience.
Although we didn't have the time to visit Lenin in his mausoleum, we did manage a tour of the Kremlin, including the Armoury Museum, with its stunning display of pre-revolution royal clothes, coaches, weaponry, gold and silverware and Fabergé eggs.
The mystique of a foreign language worked in reverse while we were being taken round by an English-speaking tour guide, as a number of teenage locals decided to attach themselves to our group, rather than their own familiar Russian-speaking one.
The fact that the Inter Milan football team, in town to play Spartak Moscow in the Champions League, was staying in our hotel, added to the excitement, and having experienced for ourselves the appalling traffic jams Muscovites endure each day, it was amusing to read the next day that the local team coach was stuck in a jam so lengthy that the players and staff were forced to abandon it and sprint for the metro in order to make the kick off. 
 

A press event with Ryanair's Michael O'Leary (above) always promises to be interesting, and yesterday's event in London was no exception. Wearing his everyman check shirt and at times trying extremely hard not to swear ("ffffffffflipping security"), O'Leary rapidly got down to business.
Although O'Leary refused to talk about Ryanair's proposed takeover of Aer Lingus, he did reveal plans to introduce in-flight gaming on all of its flights. In what O'Leary calls "a logical development", Ryanair has joined forces with UK online gaming website jackpotjoy and plans to provide the world's first in-flight online gaming.
Passengers using the service can play Bingo and instant-win games with the chance of winning a cash jackpot. They could also play to win back the price of their flight.
But despite all the hoo-ha of yesterday's "launch", the scheme is still theoretical. While passengers can sign up and play online at home, the technology has not yet been ironed out for in-flight access.
That, apparently, is hinging on Ryanair's first priority: in-flight mobile telephony. Passengers will use their mobiles to access the online gaming. But in-flight telephony is still months away, as mobile phone providers seek approval from the FAA and other regulatory bodies. In fact in-flight mobile phone use won't be rolled out before June or July 2007 and online gambling is expected a couple of months later.
When asked why Ryanair had chosen to launch the scheme now when the technology isn't even approved, O'Leary was typically frank: "The technology is already decided and we decided to give ourselves a 9-12 month run at it with the website to develop a degree of expertise."
For those that don't own a mobile phone, there is the possibility of handing out handsets on each flight.
Ancillary revenue is obviously a key area for Ryanair: with ancillary revenue growth at 16% it outstrips passenger revenue growth. O'Leary expects this figure to grow to 20% in the next five years.

Alaska Airlines, one of the first carriers to offer e-tickets and to rely on the web for in-house communications, has advanced into the collaborative community outreach of the next-generation of the web with a site that lets passengers share memorable travel stories. The 'Your Alaska Stories' site invites flyers to share stories and experiences, post pictures and so on. The first few offerings have been fairly soft, such as 'Big Girl's Trip to SFO' and 'Mom', about family experiences, with snapshots uploaded as well. Similar to the blogs that a few carriers, led by Southwest, have introduced, this is perhaps the deepest foray yet by an airline into what's called 'social networking,' a key element of what Forrester's Henry Harteveldt calls Web 2.0. Some fare-search and supplier sites have invited this kind of collaborative input, with blogs and reviews, but these have often served as outlet valves for unhappy travellers who see airlines as targets of their anger. Marking the carrier's 75th anniversary next year, the Alaska site also invites airline employees and retirees to contribute.

Other carriers have been far more subtle about their entrance into blogging: Midwest Airlines, long known as Midwest Express, launched an affiliated blog in September, but revealed it only in November. This one, girlfriendsgetaway.wordpress.com, is different: it's explicitly aimed at women with postings about shopping, museums, hotels and other attractions in the cities on the Midwest route map. The author, however, has been really there and done that: Tish Robinson, a writer in the Milwaukee-based airline's marketing department, does the blog on her own, based on her personal experiences.

Tish - represented by a cute, retro line-drawing that portrays her as the sort of woman one would see in 1970s advertisement about young, modern women who would still be sort-of hip and a smart shopper if and when she becomes a housewife - works for the airline, but tries to keep the carrier out of her postings. Trish will post Midwest promotional fares and special deals she gets from hotels or retail stores that gave discounts to her readers. The relationship between the blog and the airline is low-key but not hidden, with links from the Midwest consumer website and some search-engine links, says Midwest chief marketing officer Scott Dickson. Woman-to-woman blogging is a booming field, according to the BlogHer website, and may be a natural connection to the fact that women are often the key purchase-deciders when it comes to discretionary and leisure travel. Tish tells us that the idea came about from research her boss requested, but that the blog is very much a personal task, dedicated to what she calls her free sprit: "I'm always upbeat and ready to go, ready to try new things, with my bag on my shoulder". She says that if she really likes a hotel, a restaurant or another attraction, she will ask for a deal for her readers: "and it's not necessarily a discount. Sometimes it's just fresh flowers in the room. And it's always after the fact". No one has yet to say no to a Tish request.Tish says she's happy to be able to visit places on her own rather than escorting her kids' eight-grade class.

It is not she insists an advertisement. "The readers get it that it's a Midwest Airlines blog. All the links to airlines features are to Midwest even though we don't use the logo, but no one has said anything suggesting that it's anything but a Midwest site". The airline isn't now thinking about a blog for men, and Tish says that all at Midwest felt that a blog from the CEO or from the technical people at the airline wouldn't quite get across the airline's character or her own personality. The airline has always had a Midwestern personality, sort of slightly more relaxed and more affluent cousin of Northwest Airlines: whereas Northwest would feel it's been hospitable just by getting you there, Midwest has done things like offer chocolate chip cookies fresh-baked on board.

Everyone wants to be wanted, but AirTran is making absolutely, positively sure it will go only where the people really want it. The discounter, which is slowing down its rapid growth, has asked people into tell it which city to put on its map next. It has put up a page on its website with 49 possible choices for its next city. "The input we receive certainly will factor into decisions on where we add" future service, AirTran planning vice president Kevin Healy said. In other words, it will listen to the voice of the people, but only up to a point. Cities on the list include Fort Wayne, Indiana; Albany, N.Y.; San Juan, Puerto Rico, and even Chicago O'Hare. People get to check a box and then fill in their email address to be notified if and when AirTran comes to their city. The page does not give any address to which a community or its local airport could send cash, er 'incentive' payments. Vote at airtran.com/nextcity, but please bear in mind that Manchester, New Hampshire, is in range but Manchester is not. Within days of the AirTran launch of the site, cities began to urge their discount-hungry flyers to vote. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania's capital city that has been begging for low-cost carrier service for years, told people on its airport mailing list to vote, reminding them 'Your family and friends can vote, too'. This could get interesting: the old saying in Chicago was 'vote early, vote often, alive or not'.