Japan Airlines Opens Haneda

5 February 2019

Japana Airlines has commenced new midnight flight between Tokyo Haneda (HND) and Manila (MNL) on 1 February. The route will be flown with Boeing 737-800s daily. Japan Airlines also operates a twice-daily B787-800 connection from Narita to Manila.

JAL comforts Philippine passengers

Amidst bankruptcy declaration

January 22, 2010

TOKYO - Japan Airlines (JAL) sought to reassure the traveling public in the Philippines that it will keep flying despite declaring bankruptcy as it plans to keep flight to Manila which the airline said is not one of its unprofitable routes.

The national carrier also announced that it intends to retire its 37 Boeing 747-400s, axe 15,700 jobs almost equivalent to one-third of its workforce, and cut unprofitable routes.

JAL has a fleet of 279 aircraft with more than 70 on order, including 35 Boeing 787s. It serves 217 destinations in 35 countries. It intends to continue flying the Philippines using a much smaller Boeing triple seven and B767 series planes.

The debt-laden carrier has apologized for causing "tremendous worries to customers" and promised that "JAL will keep flying" and that passengers' air miles will remain valid.

"Please be reassured and use us as before," the company pleaded.

The once iconic airline, a symbol of Japan's rise to prosperity, filed for bankruptcy protection Tuesday with 26 billion dollars in debt in the country's biggest post-war corporate failure outside the financial sector.

JAL, which carries more than 50 million passengers a year, is set to receive almost 10 billion dollars in public funds and emergency loans under a three-year turnaround plan.

The Tokyo Stock Exchange will delist JAL shares by February 20, a move expected to wipe out shareholders' investments.

The company has made no announcement regarding its tie-up talks with American and Delta Air Lines, which are in a bidding war for a slice of the carrier, eyeing its lucrative Asian landing slots.

JAL is understood to prefer switching its alliance from the American Airlines-led oneworld grouping to SkyTeam with Delta.

But it is expected to take some time for JAL and Delta to clear anti-trust hurdles and get approval from US authorities for joint operations.

The government has tapped Kazuo Inamori, a 77-year-old entrepreneur, business guru and ordained Buddhist monk, to run the stricken airline during its overhaul, replacing Haruka Nishimatsu, who resigned as president Tuesday.

Manila remains a profitable destination for JAL

But cuts 21 other International Routes

September 26, 2009

Tokyo - Asia's biggest airline announced this week that it intends to keep its operations in the Philippines amidst recent announcement of cutting 21 of its unprofitable international routes as part of the company's massive re-structuring program after reporting $ 1 billion in losses for the period of April-June this year.

Japan Airlines operation to the Philippines has been downgraded since July 1, 2009 with its afternoon flight serviced by Boeing 767's due to economic downturn says the JAL Group in a statement. But in August both services were downgraded from Boeing 747 to 767 service or a capacity reduction of about 30%.

The airline said that in accordance with the FY2009 management plan, drastic adjustments are being made to the network and fleet size so as to more closely match capacity to demand, and allow the Group to improve profitability. However servicesis expected to be upgraded back slowly when traffic to and from Manila improves particularly during the peak months of December and January.

A downsizing strategy will be implemented in most of JAL's route network affecting 15 flights on 14 international routes, where jumbo 747-400s will be switched to medium-sized 777s and 767s, and medium sized 767s will be switched to even smaller 737s.

As part of its corporate reconstruction plan presented on Sept. 15, JAL will cancel all of its loss-making routes both at home and abroad within the next 3 years totaling 50 unprofitable routes that is 29 flights to cities in Japan and 21 to overseas destinations.The company also plans to completely withdraw from seven domestic and nine overseas airports.

The international routes to be abolished includes flights from Narita to Rome, Amsterdam, Brisbane and Sao Paulo, as well as those from Kansai to Singapore and Hangzhou.

JAL secured a 100 billion yen ($1.1 billion) loan from the Japanese Development Bank in June to keep flying until the end of the year but needs more money from the State to fund a restructuring plan. It seek as much as 250 billion yen ($2.5 billion) more through a mixture of equity and debt financing. It already cuts 6,800 jobs from its payroll to stay afloat.