The price war gripping the Japanese domestic market is poised to turn more vicious with the launch of new routes operated by start-up carrier Skymark Airlines.
Japan Airlines (JAL) and All Nippon Airways (ANA) have announced fresh price cuts ahead of the commencement of Skymark services from Osaka to Fukuoka and Sapporo on 24 April.
JAL responded to the approval for the new routes with a 30% cut in its one-way Osaka-Fukuoka fare, effective 1 June, while ANA says it will introduce fully flexible discount rates 30% below the full fare on both new routes.
Skymark began operating low-cost Boeing 767-300ER Tokyo-Fukuoka services in September. It and fellow start-up Air Do, which serves Tokyo-Sapporo, have already forced JAL, ANA and Japan Air System to slash some fares by up to 50%.
ANA has blamed pricing pressures from "new entrants into the market" for the upwards revision to ´11 billion ($92 million) of its predicted loss for 1998-99 (Flight International, 7-13 April).
Source: Flight International
