Oneworld has been courting JAL for long time, but even so, the decision by the Japanese carrier to come on board is something of a coup for an alliance which now appears to be the global grouping with most of that precious commodity, momentum.
While the announcements in recent months that Malev and Royal Jordanian will join oneworld have plugged some geographical gaps, capturing JAL provides not just a significant presence in the North Asian market, but also gives the alliance a significant boost in terms of scale.
Indeed, the addition of JAL will see the alliance leapfrog SkyTeam in terms of revenue and more-or-less level pegging in terms of traffic. 2004 figures suggests that, with JAL included, oneworld would have been around the 650,000 million revenue passenger kilometres (RPK) mark, just shy of SkyTeam’s 675,000 million RPK figure. And in terms of revenue, oneworld would have brought in around $77.3 billion, compared with $73.6 billion for SkyTeam.
Oneworld is also closing the gap on Star, which had a 763,000 RPK figure for 2004, and turnover of $98.5 billion.
Up to now, American Airlines and British Airways have been the dominant forces in oneworld, but JAL is certainly boxing at the same weight as the transatlantic partners, and alongside Cathay Pacific and Qantas, provides a strong Asia-Pacific power block in oneworld, which now boasts three of the top five carriers in terms of RPKs in the fast growing Asia-Pacific region.
The move will also have ramifications within the alliance, which has traditionally relied on a collection of bilateral relationships – something that has been helped by the small number of carriers involved. With three new members lined up and oneworld hinting of more to follow, a more centralised system of management may be on the agenda.
Oneworld says JAL will add 68 additional destinations, 56 of them in Japan and five in China. With JAL, Royal Jordanian and Malev, Oneworld carriers will offer services to 686 destinations in 140 countries and territories.
COLIN BAKER/LONDON
Source: Airline Business
