New owners pledge on-time Hawaiian

THE new owners of the region’s fas test growing carriers, Hawaiian Airlines, have pledged to pump capital into the airline, which has suf fered bad publicity because of late run ning in recent years and recently had to lay off 200 workers to stop the cash flow

haemorrhage.

The new owners are J. Thomas Tal bot, a wealthy California businessman, and Peter V. Ueberroth, who has been associated with a small airline in the Un ited States and who is best known as the organiser of the extremely profitable Los

Angeles Olympic Games. They replace

John H Magoon, now 74, who held 56 per cent of the stock in Hawaiian. Ma goon had made it a condition that the new owners not only had airline experi ence, but were able to inject capital into the operation. Magoon had tried to sell the airline back in 1987, but that deal fell apart because of the stock market crash; he had then hoped to find a buyer who would be resident in Hawaii.

At a recent Hawaiian Airlines Inc (HAL) stockholder meeting, the share holders approved the sale to HAL Ac quisition Inc. The new owners bought

759,500 shares at US$22 a share, plus another 909,000 shares from Magoon’s company making the total value of the deal US$37 million. Talbot will be the new chairman.

Magoon will own no shares in the new company.

Hawaiian now services several Pacific

destinations: Sydney, Auckland, Pagopa

go, Rarotonga, Papeete, Guam, as well as Tonga and Apia. The airline also leases seats to Air Rarotonga between Auck land and the Cook Islands. With new owners and adequate financial backing, Hawaiian is looking at further expansion in the region with negotiations well under way for Honolulu-Nagoya flights (Japan Air Lines still hold its 20 per cent stake in Hawaiian), is seeking traffic rights into Melbourne and believes it will be operating into Nadi within three years. Hawaiian is also looking to supple ment its fleet with the purchase of furth er LlOll Tristars. The latest announce ment is that the airline is to add a third weekly Honolulu-Nuku’alofa service from February which will connect with services to Japan a move welcomed by Tonga’s exporters of fresh produce.

The Sydney-based manager for Hawaiian operations in Australia, New Zealand and the Cook Islands, Alex Klu jin, said that eliminating the delays for which Hawaiian flights had become in creasingly known was part of the re building programme. “It’s a new start for Hawaiian,” he said. “We’ll be looking at the on-time performance and the mechanical side of the airline.” It would be a matter of rebuilding Hawaiian’s

reputation, Klujin said.

One of his priorities would be to get

more people on the flights to the Cook Islands. This sector was heavily domin ated by Cook Islanders travelling, mainly to New Zealand, and was subject to con siderable seasonal fluctuations. Hawaiian would be looking to new fare initiatives to lift loadings on what are now the lightly patronised flights, and was look ing at a tie-up with Continental to have Australian tourists fly to the Cooks via Auckland.

Hawaiian will put new effort into working with Australian travel agents and wholesalers so it could work towards greater frequency of flights than the present one a week out of that country.

It has begun offering free inter-island flights around the Hawaiian archipelago for travellers using its international ser vices.

Hawaiian began in 1929 flying eight

seater Sikorsky amphibians between Honolulu and the outer islands. It graduated to DC3s in 1941 and played a major part in inter-island transport dur ing the war. □