Certification by the US Federal Aviation Administration of the Max 7 and 10 variants of Boeing's 737 programme will likely be achieved in 2026 and not this year as previously expected, Boeing chief executive Kelly Ortberg has indicated. The US airframer has been working on finalising the anti-icing design for the engine inlet on the two variants. Ortberg on 29 May during the Bernstein Strategic Decisions Conference had said that the Max 7 and 10 were "slated to complete the certification this year". Ortberg disclosed on 29 July during an earnings call that work on the anti-icing solution is taking longer than expected. "We now are expecting certification in 2026," Ortberg says. "We don't expect a material impact to our production plans, and we're prepared to build other 737 models for our customers." "We just haven't closed the design," he adds. "We went through some testing, and this is a very delicate area that we're dealing with around the inlet of the engines, and [we] can't cause any perturbation to the airflow into the engines. "We found some issues with the design implementation we had, so we're going to have to back up and make some additional design changes to get through that de-icing requirement. Basically, the engineering design did not yield it in the time frame that we were anticipating, and so we still have work to do." Ortberg's confirmation of the certification delay follows Southwest Airlines chief executive Bob Jordan's disclosure during a 24 July earnings call that he expected the Max 7 to be certificated by the FAA "maybe first half of 2026, which would put entry into service for us, at earliest, late in '26". Southwest has by far the most Max 7s on order, with 305 expected, followed by Allegiant Air, with 24 on order, fleets data shows. Eleven additional Max 7s are on order, four of which are to be delivered to Luxair, with the remaining customers unannounced. United Airlines has the most Max 10s on order, with 167 expected, followed by Ryanair (150), American Airlines (112), and Delta Air Lines and Pegasus (100 apiece).

United Airlines and JetBlue are set to implement their "Blue Sky" collaboration, having completed the US Department of Transportation's regulatory review of the interline agreement closed by the two US carriers in May. "JetBlue and United appreciate [US Transportation] secretary Duffy, assistant secretary [Daniel] Edwards and the entire team at the DOT for their review of Blue Sky," the carriers say. "JetBlue and United will share more details in the coming weeks as implementation of the Blue Sky collaboration begins." The Blue Sky scheme establishes an interline arrangement for JetBlue flights departing New York and Boston, and for United's international flights, and links the airlines' loyalty programmes. United and JetBlue will also offer each other's flights on their respective websites and booking apps. Additionally, New York-based JetBlue will provide to United access to JFK slots for up to seven daily round-trip flights beginning in 2027. Additionally, JetBlue and United will exchange eight flight timings at the Chicago-based carrier's Newark Liberty International hub. United stopped JFK operations after October 2015, reviving them temporarily amid the Covid crisis, Cirium schedules data shows. The US major last operated JFK flights in October 2022. "It's important for us," United chief executive Scott Kirby said about United's return to JFK during a 17 July earnings call. "We've become the premier flag carrier of the United States and – being able to be in JFK – it's hard to really complete that unless we're there."

ANA Holdings has reported an operating profit of Y36.7 billion ($247 million) for the quarter ended 30 June, up 21% year-on year on the back of strong inbound -demand. "As we entered this fiscal year, we were encouraged by the continued recovery in international passenger demand alongside favorable fuel market conditions and foreign exchange rates, " says chief financial officer Kimihiro Nakahori. Its operating revenue was up 6.2% to Y549 billion, as operating expenses increased 5.2% to Y512 billion, states the group in a 29 July announcement. For the quarter, ANA's net profit fell 6.9% to Y22.9 billion. Mainline ANA recorded international passenger revenue of Y206 billion, up 8.8%, which it attributes to strong performance on three new routes from Tokyo Haneda to Milan, Stockholm and Istanbul. International ASKs were up 8.6% while RPKs were up 11.6%, pushing load factor up 2.1 percentage points to 79.3% Domestic ASKs, meanwhile, gained 1.1% as RPKs increased 5.2%, with a 2.8-point increase in load factor to 71.6%. ANA says business demand on domestic routes has not recovered to pre-pandemic levels while expenses have increased, making it a challenge to "generate profit in the domestic aviation business". Its regional low-cost regional subsidiary Peach reported a 4.5% fall in revenue to Y29.2 billion, while Air Japan's revenue jumped 51.2% to Y2.9 billion. International cargo revenue fell 2% to Y42.2 billion, even as freight volume and cargo traffic volume increased 1.5% and 2.5%, respectively. Despite concerns over US tariffs, ANA says international cargo "performed robustly" though it notes a decline in demand for triangular shipments from China to the US, which it offset by targetting demand from other parts of Asia to the US. On the domestic front, ANA's cargo revenue dipped 2% to Y5.3 billion, as freight carried and cargo traffic volume fell 2.2% and 2.1%, respectively. For the financial year ending March 2026, the group maintains a revenue forecast of Y2.37 trillion and an expected net profit of Y122 billion.