Emirates has disclosed plans to introduce retrofitted Airbus A380s featuring its new premium economy cabins on routes to New York JFK, San Francisco, Melbourne, Auckland and Singapore. The Dubai-based airline says it will operate the aircraft to New York JFK from 1 December, to Auckland from 15 January 2023, to Melbourne from 1 February 2023, to San Francisco from 15 February 2023, and to Singapore from 1 March 2023. With this, Melbourne will become the second Australian destination and San Francisco the second US destination to be served by the retrofitted A380s, the Middle Eastern carrier notes. Emirates also plans to add more premium economy seats on A380 services to Sydney in Australia and London Heathrow in the UK, starting 15 December. Additionally, it will debut the newly-enhanced A380s on route to Christchurch in New Zealand from 26 March 2023, as an extension of the Dubai to Sydney service. The carrier will have a total of 85 A380s in its active service by the end of this year, and scale up its A380 operations to 42 destinations by the end of March 2023. "In tandem, the airline is optimising its network to meet robust demand and enhancing its existing schedules to over 400 A380 departures from Dubai, offering 460,000 weekly A380 seats by March 2023, including 81,000 seats across its premium cabins, offering the very best in customer comfort," it says. Starting November, Emirates will begin work to upgrade and retrofit the interior cabins of 67 A380s and 53 Boeing 777s, with one aircraft rolling out into service every 16 days. "By 2025, nearly 4,000 new premium economy seats will be installed, 728 first class suites refurbished and over 5,000 business class seats upgraded to a new style and design," it adds.

SAS is seeking to reject one Airbus A321 equipped with IAE International Aero V2530-A5 engines as part of its US Chapter 11 restructuring. In a document submitted to a US bankruptcy court, the carrier requests permission to terminate the unexpired lease of the narrowbody (MSN 1675) with counterparty IC Airlease One. The aircraft was the subject of a sale-and-leaseback agreement in December 2015 SAS has already rejected another A321 (MSN 1848) leased from IC Airlease One as part of its restructuring process. The excess aircraft and records will be made available to the aircraft counterparty on an “as is, where is”, the airline states. Data shows that the aircraft is managed by the ITOCHU Corporation.

Australia has cleared Korean Air’s planned acquisition of compatriot Asiana Airlines. After market consultation with interested parties, the Australia Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) was satisfied that there is likely to be effective competition on direct flights between Sydney and Seoul, Korean Air said in a statement on 1 September. Qantas and Jetstar will shortly commence service on the sector, which is currently served only by Korean Air and Asiana Airlines. “Korean Air expects the Australian competition authority’s clearance to facilitate and expedite the remaining approval processes,” the flag carrier states. Providing an update of regulatory approvals for the acquisition, Korean Air says that since it submitted business combination reports on 14 January 2021 to nine countries that require reporting, it has received approval from South Korea, Turkey, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Thailand’s Trade Competition Commission stated that the submission was not necessary. In jurisdictions where reporting is arbitrary, Singapore and Malaysia have given the go-ahead while the Philippines stated that a submission was not necessary. The flag carrier states: “In order to finalise the acquisition process, Korean Air will continue to proactively communicate and cooperate with the remaining regulatory bodies where reporting is required, including the United States, the European Union, China and Japan, as well as the United Kingdom, where reporting is arbitrary.” Korean Air hopes to complete the acquisition by 30 September, having sought multiple three-month extensions from the initial end-2021 target.