Air Do


Air Do, previously known as Hokkaido International Airlines, is a regional airline operating scheduled service between the islands of Honshu and Hokkaidō in cooperation with All Nippon Airways. It is headquartered in the Oak Sapporo Building in Chūō-ku, Sapporo, and its main base of operations is Haneda Airport in Ōta, Tokyo.

History

Hokkaido International Airlines was founded in 1996 by Teruo Hamada, an entrepreneur in Hokkaidō, shortly after the Japanese government approved a domestic airline deregulation policy that would allow carriers to freely set fares on domestic routes. Hamada gathered investments from 29 other individuals who were interested in establishing a low-cost airline to compete with Japan's major domestic carriers on flights between Hokkaido cities and Tokyo. Additional capital was raised from Kyocera, Tokio Marine & Fire Insurance, Hokkaido Electric Power Company and other institutional investors, as well as from Hokkaido local governments seeking less expensive air service to Tokyo.
The company started flight operations on the Tokyo-Sapporo route, using the Air Do brand, in December 1998. Its first CEO was the former Japan manager of Virgin Atlantic Airways. Maintenance and ground handling services were outsourced to Japan Airlines. Air Do enjoyed very high load factors during its first few months of operation, as its fares were 60% to 70% of the walk-up fares offered by established airlines.
However, other airlines quickly adopted their own discounted advance purchase fares in the wake of Air Do's initial success, driving load factors down to around 50%. The Hokkaido prefectural government injected more capital in 2000 and installed one of its senior officials as head of the company. After being harder hit financially in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks, and being denied additional financing from the Hokkaido prefectural government, Air Do entered Japanese corporate restructuring procedures in June 2002.
Air Do received new equity capital from a tokumei kumiai investment fund arranged by the Development Bank of Japan, in which All Nippon Airways was a key investor. This began a number of business relationships between Air Do and ANA, including ANA code sharing on Air Do operated flights and Air Do leasing additional 767 and 737 aircraft from ANA. The fund was dissolved in September 2008 and DBJ, ANA and other investors became direct shareholders in Air Do.
The company changed its name to Air Do in October 2012.
Air Do was sanctioned by the Japanese government in December 2014 for promoting a first officer to captain despite poor performance in training. Following the business improvement order, Air Do moved to eliminate its lowest-yielding routes to Niigata, Toyama, Fukushima and Komatsu.

Destinations

Air Do operates services to the following domestic scheduled destinations from Tokyo and Sapporo :
RegionCityIATAICAOAirportNotes
HokkaidoAsahikawaAKJRJECAsahikawa Airport
HokkaidoHakodateHKDRJCHHakodate Airport
HonshuHiroshimaHIJRJOAHiroshima Airport
HonshuKobeUKBRJBEKobe Airport
HokkaidoKushiroKUHRJCKKushiro Airport
HonshuNagoyaNGORJGGChubu Centrair International Airport
HokkaidoObihiroOBORJCBTokachi–Obihiro Airport
HonshuOkayamaOKJRJOBOkayama Airport
HokkaidoŌzoraMMBRJCMMemanbetsu Airport
HokkaidoSapporoCTSRJCCNew Chitose Airport
HonshuSendaiSDJRJSSSendai Airport
HonshuTokyoHNDRJTTHaneda Airport

Fleet

Current Fleet

The Air Do fleet consists of the following aircraft :

AircraftIn FleetOrdersPassengers
Boeing 737-70080144
Boeing 767-30020270
Boeing 767-300ER40286
Total140

Former Fleet

The airline previously operated the following aircraft as of September 2018:

AircraftTotalIntroducedRetiredNotes
Boeing 737-400220052009
Boeing 737-500720082016
Boeing 767-200120032005
Boeing 767-300220052016