Andrzej Jeziorski/TOKYO
Japan Airlines (JAL) is to explore a passenger codeshare agreement and a merger of frequent flier programmes with British Airways as another step towards eventual possible membership of the growing oneworld alliance.
According to airline sources in Tokyo, a verbal agreement to hold talks on passenger co-operation was struck by JAL president Isao Kaneko and BA chief executive Bob Ayling at a meeting on 7 December. JAL has existing or developing codeshare and frequent flier co-operation agreements with the other four founder members of oneworld: American Airlines, Canadian Airlines, Cathay Pacific Airways and Qantas.
Until now, however, co-operation with BA has been restricted to a joint Boeing 747 freighter service between London-Heathrow and Tokyo-Narita. "We met with BA, and in view of our long commercial association with them in air cargo -we are both going to explore the possibility of expanding the areas of mutual co-operation," says Kaneko.
Kaneko remains cautious in his approach to oneworld, however, stressing the airline's traditional preference for bilateral agreements where the benefits and costs to each partner are clearer, and which do not force a new member to sever other co-operative links with conditions of exclusivity.
All Nippon Airways (ANA) executive vice-president Koji Yamashita, for example, admits that ANA will inevitably be forced to terminate existing frequent flier co-operation with BA and Delta Air Lines as a result of its plan to join the Star Alliance in October 1999.
"First of all, we are thinking of whether co-operation is truly beneficial. My target is to make JAL a profitable and healthy company, and to join an alliance or not is just one possible strategy," Kaneko says.
According to JAL senior managing director Shinzo Suto, some concern remains about the effect of merging JAL's frequent flier programme with those of the other oneworld airlines. Passengers will then be able to collect JAL air miles without actually flying on a JAL service, while other programme members will be able to collect on other schemes while flying with the Japanese carrier.
Other JAL concerns about an alliance include maintaining its corporate identity and independence, and the cost of sharing airport facilities, as well as the demand for exclusivity as a condition of alliance membership.
Source: Flight International
