China Airlines Ltd (CAL, 中華航空) would end a salary reduction program next month and is not considering dismissing any staff, even though it is still not known whether demand for air travel will recover in the second half of this year, CAL chairman Hsieh Shih-chien (謝世謙) said yesterday.
State-run CAL in April announced that it would reduce salaries by 15 percent for employees, 20 percent for managers or section chiefs, and 25 percent for vice presidents and senior management in a move that was estimated to save NT$150 million (US$5.06 million) per month.
“We implemented the salary reduction [scheme] to avoid layoffs. So far, we have not considered any job cuts, as the situation is still manageable thanks to a boom in our cargo business,” Hsieh said at an annual general meeting in Taoyuan.
While most of CAL’s passenger aircraft have been idle due to flight cancelations caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and its monthly passenger revenue sank to NT$400 million from NT$10 billion a year earlier, the airline’s 18 cargo aircraft have become its pillar, generating enough revenue to sustain its business, Hsieh said.
CAL has also received more orders on higher freight rates since the outbreak began, he said.
CAL’s cargo revenue last month reached NT$9.12 billion, the highest for a single month, with cumulative cargo revenue growing 60 percent to NT$27.55 billion in the first five months of this year, company data showed.
“Salary cuts would end at the end of next month, according to our agreement with the labor union. Whether we will negotiate with the union again on pay cuts depends on the development of the pandemic,” Hsieh said.
“This is a tough year for airlines. Our main target is to survive. Demand for business travel would bounce back first, while it is still unknown when demand for regular travel would recover,” he said.
CAL is scheduled to receive one Boeing 777 freighter by the end of this year.
The airline plans to focus on gaining orders from local clients, and foreign clients in Southeast Asia and China, it said.
As the airline operates 10 Boeing 777-300ER passenger aircraft, it has trained some of its pilots to fly the wide-body jets and they are now ready to fly the cargo planes, it said.
CAL’s board of directors has not discussed renaming the airline, although some pro-independence groups earlier this month called on lawmakers to heed mainstream public opinion and review motions to rename it, Hsieh said.
TEMPORARY TRUCE: China has made concessions to ease rare earth trade controls, among others, while Washington holds fire on a 100% tariff on all Chinese goods China is effectively suspending implementation of additional export controls on rare earth metals and terminating investigations targeting US companies in the semiconductor supply chain, the White House announced. The White House on Saturday issued a fact sheet outlining some details of the trade pact agreed to earlier in the week by US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) that aimed to ease tensions between the world’s two largest economies. Under the deal, China is to issue general licenses valid for exports of rare earths, gallium, germanium, antimony and graphite “for the benefit of US end users and their suppliers
Dutch chipmaker Nexperia BV’s China unit yesterday said that it had established sufficient inventories of finished goods and works-in-progress, and that its supply chain remained secure and stable after its parent halted wafer supplies. The Dutch company suspended supplies of wafers to its Chinese assembly plant a week ago, calling it “a direct consequence of the local management’s recent failure to comply with the agreed contractual payment terms,” Reuters reported on Friday last week. Its China unit called Nexperia’s suspension “unilateral” and “extremely irresponsible,” adding that the Dutch parent’s claim about contractual payment was “misleading and highly deceptive,” according to a statement
The Chinese government has issued guidance requiring new data center projects that have received any state funds to only use domestically made artificial intelligence (AI) chips, two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. In recent weeks, Chinese regulatory authorities have ordered such data centers that are less than 30 percent complete to remove all installed foreign chips, or cancel plans to purchase them, while projects in a more advanced stage would be decided on a case-by-case basis, the sources said. The move could represent one of China’s most aggressive steps yet to eliminate foreign technology from its critical infrastructure amid a
Nissan Motor Co has agreed to sell its global headquarters in Yokohama for ￥97 billion (US$630 million) to a group sponsored by Taiwanese autoparts maker Minth Group (敏實集團), as the struggling automaker seeks to shore up its financial position. The acquisition is led by a special purchase company managed by KJR Management Ltd, a Japanese real-estate unit of private equity giant KKR & Co, people familiar with the matter said. KJR said it would act as asset manager together with Mizuho Real Estate Management Co. Nissan is undergoing a broad cost-cutting campaign by eliminating jobs and shuttering plants as it grapples
RSS