EVA Airways, Taiwan's No. 2 carrier, agreed to sell seats jointly with American Airlines under a so-called code-sharing agreement.
The agreement calls for EVA and American, the second-largest US carrier, to sell seats on each other's trans-Pacific flights and on American Airlines' connecting flights in the US.
"American Airlines and EVA Air have found their service and route structures to be compatible," the Taiwanese carrier said in a statement.
"Under the planned marketing arrangement, American Airline's passengers can fly EVA Air between Taipei and Honolulu, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle," an EVA Air spokesman said.
"These passengers can also conveniently travel onward to most major cities in Asia using EVA Air's extensive regional network," he said.
In the meantime, he said, "US-bound passengers can use EVA Air's trans-pacific service to connect with America's vast domestic system via flights to Boston, Chicago, Washington, DC, New York, Dallas, Miami and Austin." EVA operates 35 round-trip flights per week between Taiwan and the US American currently operates no flights to Taiwan.
EVA, 27 percent owned by Taiwan's Evergreen Marine Corp and 25 percent by its employees, plans to raise about NT$200 million (US$6.3 million) by selling shares to the public in October for the first time.
The alliance may bring EVA Air a step closer to joining Oneworld, the world's second-largest airline alliance led by American Airlines and British Airways Plc, analysts said.
EVA and British Airway already have a code-sharing agreement for their cargo routes.
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