Following approval by us. and Japanese authorities for antitrust immunity, American Airfines and Japan Airlines (JAL) began sharing routes in 2011 that connect mainland North America with East Asia through a non-equity joint venture, Map 15.2 shows these routes and also illustrates that flights between Honolulu and Japan are not included in the agreement. This JV is similar to one forged among AA, British Airways (BA), and Iberia trans-Atlantic travel that began operating in 2010, both cases, the agreement from each airline to jointly manage capacity, sell and promote space on flights operated by each other. divide revenues, and schedule connecting flights. The major thrusts for these ventures are to cut operating costs by better controlling capacity, to avoid di tive price ompetition, and to improve scheduling so that there are more and better times and connections for passengers. historical series of alliances linking international The proposals are merely to a the airline industry is unique in that its need to form collaborative arrange- ments has been important almost from the start of international air travel because of regular tory, cost, and competitive factors In recent years, this need has accelerated because of airlines' difficult profit performance effect, the airlines have been squeezed. First, costs have risen, particularty due to oil since 9/11. While pre-departure airport passenger prices and the need for greater security ecurity checks are well publicized, some other costly airline security processes are not. such as providing governmental agencies with advance passenger information and working with freight forwarders and supply-chain operators to ensure the safety of cargo shipments carried on passenger aircraft. Second, a long-term trend toward greater price competition hinders airlines' ability to pass on increased costs to passengers-a situation exacerbated by the emergence of discount airlines and customers' ability to search the Internet for lower fares. Third, with the global recession curtailing passenger demand the airline industry has added capacity sparingly. Although the growth in international passenger jet travel largely spurred globalization, no airline has sufficient finances or aircraft to serve the whole world. Yet passengers are traveling the whole world and perceive an advantage in booking on airline connections that will minimize both distances and connecting times at airports while offering reasonable assurance of reaching destinations with checked luggage more or less on schedule. Thus, airlines have increasingly worked together to provide more seamless experiences for passengers and to cut costs