Air France-KLM join JAL bidding

Bosses insist services will continue to operate as normal

Air France-KLM has entered the race to invest in ailing Japan Airlines (JAL).

Reports today have flooded news wires claiming the European carrier wants to inject hundreds of millions of dollars into the loss-making company in return for a small stake.

The Japanese government was believed to prefer the approaches made by Air France-KLM and its Skyteam partner Delta, than that of JAL's current Oneworld partner, American Airlines.

However, JAL's current executives are known to want to remain in the British Airways-led Oneworld alliance. JAL and American have been code-sharing partners for a decade.

Meanwhile, the group tasked with overseeing the airline's immediate future said services will continue to operate "smoothly without any interruption as usual".

The Enterprise Turnaround Initiative Corporation (ETIC) said flight operations and the JAL Mileage Bank services - its frequent flyers scheme - will be "maintained as before with the support of the Japanese Government".

The ETIC - a quasi sovereign turnaround fund - said it was in the process of forming a business revitalisation plan in which it intended to ensure all business operations on and off the ground would be performed "smoothly without any interruption as usual with sufficient amount of capital".

It went on to say there would be no change to the validity of tickets: "All the flight tickets are to be used as usual including changes, refunds, etc."

In a statement on its website JAL apologised for "the concern and anxiety caused" by speculation surrounding its future, insisting talks with the ETIC would leave the company in "optimal shape".

www.etic-j.co.jp    www.jal.com