Japan Travel Trade Weekly News
Keeping you abreast of what's going on in the
Japanese travel and tourism industries.
News consolidated by Travel Vision, Inc. updated every week.
H.I.S. Revises Earnings Estimate Downward in Wake of 1Q Results,
Expresses Concern over Weak Demand under Weight of Soaring Oil Prices
Late-March 2008
H.I.S. released lower-than-expected earnings report for the first
quarter of the new fiscal year (November 1, 2007 - January 31, 2008)
on the consolidated basis, namely, 1,160 million yen in operating
profit, down 9.8 percent from the previous year, 1,459 million yen in
pretax profit, down 7.0 percent, and 936 million yen in net profit,
down 3.1 percent, on revenue of 85,396 million yen, up 5.7 percent.
Japanese overseas travelers during these three months slowed down
to a negative growth of 2.8 percent with 4,188,000 people. Despite
the company's efforts in the New Year sales campaign and online air
ticket sales promotion, it could not emerge from the stale market
crippled by the fewer number of outbound travelers and the
fuel-related additional charges.
Since H.I.S. speculates that the number of customers in its
handling is unlikely to grow in large over a period of time, it
lowers the estimates of revenue and operating profit. It also revises
the expected pretax profit downward because foreign exchange losses
of 300 million yen for the first half of the fiscal year and 680
million yen for the second half must be taken into account.
Initially, H.I.S. set a goal of attaining two-digit growth in
revenue, operating profit, and pretax profit both for the midterm and
the full year. Now it slashes the annual goal to a growth of 7
percent in revenue over the previous year, a growth of 3 percent in
operating profit, and a negative growth of 15 percent in pretax
profit due to the exchange losses. The details are listed below.
* Revised goals of H.I.S.
Revenue/operating profit/pretax profit/net profit in billion yen
(% change over the previous year in parentheses)
Midterm: 175 (+3.8%) / 2.3 (-21.3%) / 2.4 (-28.3%) / 1.5 (-26.1%)
Full year: 389 (+7.4%) / 6.6 (+3.7%) / 6.4 (-14.8%) / 3.8 (+15.9%)
Cathay Pacific Strongly Hopes to Inaugurate Regular Service to
Haneda, With An Eye on Airport Expansion Foreseen in 2010
Late-March 2008
Commenting on charter flight operations to/ from Haneda planned
during April and May this year, James Woodrow, General Manager Japan,
and Steve Wong, Marketing and Sales Manager Japan, Cathay Pacific
Airways, indicated their strong wish that "the airline be granted
traffic rights to operate scheduled service between Haneda and Hong
Kong once the expansion of Tokyo's Haneda Airport is completed in
2010."
Cathay Pacific will fly into Haneda in April for the first time
in approximately 30 years since May of 1978 when all international
flights were moved out to Narita Airport. One problem is, however,
that the planned schedule will require along ground time during the
day at Haneda, causing the airline a considerable loss in flight
operations.
"A long daytime ground time is far from ideal and in this regard,
we hope that Hong Kong will see the same progress by 2010 for a
scheduled service as Seoul and Shanghai," said Woodrow, the airline's
General Manager Japan, anticipating that Hong Kong will be added to
the international network from Haneda.
Wong, Marketing and Sales Manager Japan also added, "The Hong
Kong market enjoys a robust outbound traffic with a high ratio of the
number of passport holders. Japan will become as popular a
destination from Hong Kong as Bangkok, Thailand and Taipei." "Cathay
Pacific can also expect substantial traffic demand from Japan," Wong
was convinced. "The airline will be able to succeed in establishing a
stable operations reflecting traffic demand both from Japan and Hong
Kong."
The number of charter flights planned during this year will be
approximately 103 flights, about the same number operated last year
by Cathay Pacific and Dragon Air (KA). Regarding operations at
regional airports except for Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka, Wong mentioned
that the airline will try to balance supply and demand. Although he
did not reveal the actual number of charter flights to operate this
year, the airline will no doubt increase the number after negotiating
with travel agents.
JALPAK Nominates as Next President Mr. Tetsuo Takahashi, CEO of JAL
Royal Catering
Late-March 2008
JALPAK decided informally to have Tetsuo Takahashi, CEO and
president of JAL Royal Catering Co., as the next president. He joined
Japan Airlines in April 1974, became managing director of JAL Sales
Co. in April 2004 and senior vice president of Japan Airlines
International and of Japan Airlines Domestic in April 2005, then
assumed the present position in June 2006. His nomination is to be
approved at the shareholders general meeting and the board of
directors' meeting scheduled at the end of June.
Mr. Takahashi attended the JATA World Tourism Congress in 2004 as
managing director of JAL Sales, made a proposal for making package
tours based on APEX fare, and expounded his views in an attempt to
seek new business models for the travel industry, all of which prove
he is well versed in travel business.
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