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Strategic acquisition increases VerifyMe's service offerings, and geographic markets

LAKE MARY, Fla. , March 2, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- VerifyMe, Inc. (NASDAQ: VRME) together with its subsidiary PeriShip Global LLC ("PeriShip Global"), (together "VerifyMe," "we," "our," or the "Company") provides brand owners time and temperature sensitive logistics, supply chain monitoring, authentication, and data-rich consumer engagement services, announced today that it has acquired the assets of Trust Codes Limited, a New Zealand business specializing in unique item level codes for brand protection, data intelligence and consumer engagement technology with an expertise in the food and agriculture industry.  This acquisition will strengthen VerifyMe's ability to deliver product traceability services to a global customer base.

Trust Codes Limited, founded in 2013, delivers cloud-based brand protection based on a unique per-item digital identity.  Leveraging  advanced algorithms and machine learning, the Trust Codes solution helps protect brand and product authenticity, increases data visualization of a product through the end to end supply chain, and creates a data-driven engine to inform and educate consumers of the product. Brand owners are able to engage directly with their consumer to build brand trust and connect to the provenance of a product.   Trust Codes Limited currently has employees in New Zealand and Australia and an existing customer base with recurring revenue.

Patrick White, VerifyMe's Chief Executive Officer, commented, "With much of Trust Codes customer base being in the food space, it provides a great opportunity to leverage that with PeriShip's customers and service offerings.  We believe the two organizations have significant synergies, and with the innovative and sophisticated proprietary platform of Trust Codes and VerifyMe's presence in the US and Europe we will continue to grow our existing market share and expand into new markets to include Australasia and China."

"Trust Codes Limited with its experienced management team and its proven brand protection solutions is excited at the opportunities this transaction creates for us to work with the VerifyMe team and expand our full suite of services into the US market and globally," said Paul Ryan, Trust Codes Limited, CEO.

About VerifyMe, Inc.

VerifyMe, Inc. (NASDAQ: VRME), together with its wholly owned subsidiary PeriShip Global, is a software driven logistics provider of high-touch, end-to-end logistics management. We provide logistics management from a sophisticated IT platform with proprietary databases, package and flight-tracking software, weather, and flight status monitoring systems, as well as dynamic dashboards with real-time visibility into shipment transit and last-mile events. In addition, VerifyMe provides brand protection and consumer engagement solutions allowing brand owners to gather business intelligence. To learn more, visit www.verifyme.com.

About Trust Codes Limited

Trust Codes, based in New Zealand, provides brand protection based on a digital identity for each unique item. Connecting brands to consumers, the use of unique QR codes or IoT, coupled with GS1 standards, enables transparency and traceability through a product's lifecycle. Trust Codes leverage advanced algorithms to protect authenticity and brand value. Data-driven storytelling allows visibility of the journey for each item through the supply chain to the consumer's hands. For additional information, please visit: https://www.trust.codes.

AFT Pharmaceuticals (NZX.AFT, ASX.AFP) today announces the US Food and Drug Administration has approved a rapid release tablet form of Maxigesic for the management of mild to moderate acute pain in the US.

The approval for Maxigesic Rapid® - a unique, patented combination of 325 mg of paracetamol and 97.5 mg of ibuprofen that deploys a patented rapid release technology1 – opens an analgesic market to AFT in the US that is worth around US$7.16 billion and is expected to grow by 5.8% a year between now and 2027.

AFT Managing Director Dr Hartley Atkinson says: “We are delighted with the FDA approval of this prescription medicine and excited about the growth opportunities it opens for the company. We have held talks with potential US licensees for the medicine and are evaluating US market entry plans to maximise its commercial potential. We also importantly see this as a therapeutic option to help doctors battle the opioid epidemic in the US.

Dr Atkinson said the FDA approval for Maxigesic Rapid release tablets represents the first step for the family of medicines in the important US market. The company is awaiting approval for the intravenous form of the patented medicine Maxigesic IV and is also considering the release of other dose forms in the market.

The US approval follows on other commercial successes with Maxigesic. Maxigesic Oral Liquid, a patented unique combination of 160mg paracetamol and 48mg ibuprofen per 5ml oral suspension for children, has recently received approval in an additional 12 European countries via the European Union’s decentralized registration procedure.

The approval clears the way for registration approvals of the medicine in Estonia; Hungary; Lithuania; Latvia; Slovenia; Bulgaria; Cyprus; the Czech Republic; Romania; Slovakia; Greece and Poland.

AFT Managing Director Dr Hartley Atkinson says: “The Maxigesic commercialisation programme continues to make steady progress and the increasing regulatory approvals and consequent launches will contribute to our international sales going forward.” 

Source: https://investors.aftpharm.com/

Tracksuit, a New Zealand-based brand tracking startup, wants to take on traditional market research players by offering a more affordable, accessible brand insights tool.

“Market research and brand tracking has been around for a long time, and it usually consists of a consultant coming in on a quarterly or biannual basis with a 100-page slide deck and a lot of complex data that looks behind not forward,” Matt Herbert, co-founder and co-CEO of Tracksuit, told TechCrunch, noting that most market research services have been reserved for enterprise-level companies, leaving smaller and mid-sized companies with less access to such insights.

“With Tracksuit, we wanted to make an affordable, always-on, easy-to-use way of accessing these insights.”

Tracksuit launched in 2021 with an intuitive dashboard that tracks metrics like brand awareness, consideration, preference and usage, and measures them against a company’s competitive set. It’s a software-as-a-service product with a flat fee that Herbert says is 10x cheaper than the current standard.

Tracksuit’s tool now tracks insights for more than 1,300 brands across New Zealand, Australia, the United Kingdom and, most recently, the United States. The company recently closed $5 million in its first external round, and will use the money to expand further into the U.S. market. Tracksuit made its first hire in New York City in November, and is building a 10-person team there to support expansion.

The round, led by Blackbird, also included participation from Shasta Ventures, Icehouse Ventures, Ascential and brand consultant Mark Ritson.

“Strong brands are the difference between good companies and great companies – whether they’re selling physical products or software,” said Phoebe Harrop, a partner at Blackbird, in a statement. “The magic of Tracksuit is giving companies across every industry a common language for measuring, talking about and investing in brand health.”

“A common language.” That’s what Herbert told TechCrunch Tracksuit is trying to achieve — a standard for evaluating, understanding and communicating the value of brands.

The startup is targeting mid-sized, growing consumer brands across food and beverage, FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods), retail, direct-to-consumer and financial services. Herbert said half of its customers come from the existing brand tracking market, but the other half is a new segment entirely that has previously not been served by the market research industry. Some key customers today include Made by Nacho, Charity: Water and Athletic Brewing Company.

Herbert says the strong demand for the company’s product suggests a shift in how consumer businesses approach marketing. They’re focused “less on immediate conversion and more on building long-term growth through highly effective, creative marketing,” he said.

Tracksuit gathers insights by surveying target customers around the globe. It uses those surveys to set up a brand’s fundamentals: What’s the total addressable market? How well is the brand known, how well is it considered, where is it most preferred? What do people really think and feel about the brand, and how does that shift over time?

From there, Tracksuit goes deeper.

“Each brand will have strategic pillars or value propositions that they want to own, so we help those brands track how well they are performing against those brand pillars and how well their comms and advertising and marketing is shifting the needle on those perceptions and attributes for the consumer,” said Herbert, as he showed me a demo of Tracksuit’s “unprompted imagery” feature, a word cloud that shows which words come to mind for a specific brand, positioned next to a similar word cloud for that brand’s biggest competitor.

All of these insights help brands ask the big question of What’s the job to be done? It’s hard to sell to someone who hasn’t heard of your brand, so maybe Tracksuit’s insights could help a brand learn that it has to increase awareness before anything else.

“What is the opportunity to grow and where should that be focused in your advertising, communications and marketing strategy?” said Herbert.

Source: https://techcrunch.com/

New Zealand has been granted excepted foreign state investor status from the United States, making it easier for New Zealand investors to invest in the US and deepen ties with a key trade partner.

“This is a very positive outcome for New Zealand after being granted provisional excepted status in January 2022. We are one of only a few countries to be awarded this status,” Grant Robertson said.

“Ministers and officials from across a number of agencies have worked tirelessly to secure an exemption and I would like to thank them for their efforts and hard work in achieving this goal.

“New Zealand’s inclusion in the excepted states list alongside Australia, Canada, and the UK will lower the barriers for New Zealand investors and support further growth in investment into the US and provide more options for diversification.

“New Zealand firms developing critical technologies or dealing with critical infrastructure such as renewable energy, as well as in personal data, stand to benefit. It also makes it easier for government investment vehicles like the NZ Super Fund to invest in the US in areas such as green technologies.

“Receiving excepted foreign state investor status has been a priority for New Zealand since 2018, when the US introduced reforms that increased the requirements for screening investments in sensitive areas. Australia, Canada and the UK were given exceptions in 2020 and put New Zealand investors at a disadvantage when compared to investors from these countries.

Trade and Export Growth Minister Damien O’Connor welcomed the status.

“This is a positive step towards stronger trade and business links with a very good friend of New Zealand,” Damien O’Connor said.

“New Zealand has undertaken a series of reforms to the Overseas Investment Act since 2018, including around investment screening, bringing the Act in line with overseas investment regimes, including in the US,” Grant Robertson said.

“This decision reflects US confidence in New Zealand’s foreign investment regulatory settings and the close relationship between the two countries.”

Source: https://www.beehive.govt.nz/

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Auckland – February 7, 2023 – Slalom, the global business and technology consulting company, today announced the opening of a new office in New Zealand. Slalom’s office in Auckland will serve customers throughout the country, including notable local companies Air New Zealand, Fidelity Life and Vector, and global partners such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), Salesforce, and Snowflake. 

Slalom expects to hire more than 50 professionals through the next year to support customers who want help to accelerate their growth and transformation, embrace emerging technology, and deliver initiatives faster and better. Slalom’s initial service offering for New Zealand includes a range of industries, including agriculture, technology, manufacturing, financial services, health, and life sciences.  

“Slalom New Zealand sets itself apart from competitors because our consultants are local, but our capabilities are global and we can help New Zealand customers expand their reach around the world,” said Michael Shimota, President and Country Leader, Australia and New Zealand. “We offer clients end to end services, from strategic consulting to building amazing products, so they can connect more deeply and best serve their customers.”

Auckland is the fourth Asia-Pacific office to open in the past three years following Melbourne, Sydney, and Tokyo. “Customers like to work with Slalom because we are different,” said John Tobin, Slalom Co-Founder and Executive President of EMEA and APAC. “Our purpose-driven, fiercely human approach is how we can help New Zealand companies address their strategic, technological, and business transformation needs.” 

Slalom’s global team of 13,000 is an award-winning partner to 400 of the most innovative technology companies in the world, including AWS, Salesforce, Google Cloud, Microsoft, and Tableau. It has been recognized as a best company to work for by Fortune Magazine, Glassdoor, Forbes Magazine, and Human Rights Campaign.

About Slalom 

Slalom is a purpose-led, global business and technology consulting company. From strategy to implementation, our approach is fiercely human. In seven countries and 44 markets, we deeply understand our customers—and their customers—to deliver practical, end-to-end solutions that drive meaningful impact. Backed by close partnerships with over 400 leading technology providers, our 13,000+ strong team helps people and organizations dream bigger, move faster, and build better tomorrows for all. We’re honored to be consistently recognized as a great place to work, including being one of Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For seven years running. Learn more at slalom.com.

MEA celebrates 10-year anniversary and 10% market share

Photo and retail specialist MEA today announced a new milestone with its capture of 10% of the US retail photo print market. The company's ad-tech and e-commerce solutions are disrupting the retail photo print industry, driving photo-lab growth and transporting customers into stores such as CVS and Walgreens.

Convenient phone apps, a growing gifting culture, and rising demand for personalized photo products are driving online photo print growth. The US retail photo print market is expected to reach $786 million this year, with over 4.2 billion 4x6" prints developed at stores.

MEA's 10% market share milestone coincides with the 10-year anniversary of its flagship photo print app Printicular. During that period, the company has focused on sustainable growth, solidifying its position as a leader in the field and is already connected to over 21,000 stores and photo labs in 11 countries.

MEA's solutions help photo and retail businesses grow.

The company has secured 10% of the US retail photo print market and 21,000 connected stores.

MEA's proprietary technologies and sustainable growth make it a stand-out in the tech sector.

"As MEA celebrates ten years of growth and success, our focus on sustainable growth and strategic technology investments has driven the company's achievements," said Bruce Seymour, Managing Director of USA at MEA. "We're thrilled to see the impact of our solutions on the retail photo print market."

For more information, get in touch at USA 203.599.1111, email info@we-are-mea.com, or visit https://www.meaphototech.com/

About MEA

MEA is a growth engine for the photo and retail industry. Our unique ad tech and e-commerce solutions help photo-labs grow and drive customers into stores. Over 21,000 stores and photo-labs in 11 countries are live on MEA’s technology platform. MEA owns photo printing apps including Photo Prints+, Photo Prints Now, Local Prints Now, and Printicular. MEA services customers worldwide and is based in New Haven, CT, USA and New Zealand.

AFT Pharmaceuticals (NZX: AFT, ASX: AFP) today announces it has reached agreement with Latitude Pharmaceuticals Inc to license Latitude’s key technology to develop a stable antibiotic eye drop for patients at risk of serious eye infections.

The total addressable market is estimated by AFT Pharmaceuticals and Latitude Pharmaceuticals as US$1 billion globally.

Latitude is a formulation development contract research organization based in San Diego, United States, that provides innovative drug formulation development services and proprietary drug delivery systems to the human and veterinary pharmaceutical industries.

The licensed intellectual property involves a patented aqueous stable formulation for an antibiotic eye drop. The antibiotic is already approved for treating a wide range of medically important bacterial infections including those caused by the antibiotic resistant MRSA (Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus) bacteria. However, no approved ophthalmic solution for this antibiotic currently exists for the treatment of serious, potentially sight-threatening infections, with the market being served with eye drop solutions made by compounding pharmacies.

AFT Managing Director Dr Hartley Atkinson says “Such extensive off-label use has validated the market potential for this antibiotic for treating a number of important ophthalmic conditions and the availability of a registered pharmaceutical product would enable insurance coverage in the key USA market while avoiding the risk of contamination from compounding operations.”

The planned development programme is expected to take 3-4 years up to the point of regulatory filings globally including in the major markets of USA, Europe, China, and Japan. The programme is intended to be included within the company’s existing research and development budget, which is forecast to be circa $12m per annum in the FY2023 and FY2024 financial years.

Dr Atkinson says: “We see this as a very worthwhile area to help the treatment of patients at risk of a serious eye infection due to drug resistant super bugs. It also offers an attractive global commercial opportunity and is aligned with our recent drive to further build up our research and development pipeline to fuel our global growth aspirations.”

Latitude President, Dr Andrew Chen, says the agreement with AFT Pharmaceuticals is an exciting opportunity for the company.

“Partnerships with companies like AFT Pharmaceuticals are essential for realising a technology’s full potential. AFT has the networks, skills, and resources to make the most of this important opportunity, and it is exciting to partner with them on this journey.”

AFT has considerable expertise in drug repurposing work (reformulation of existing drugs) having started such projects with Maxigesic back in 2004 and has previously conducted clinical studies in several countries around the world.

AFT has developed and out-licensed patented repurposed pharmaceutical products in over 100 countries and, to date, launched these products in some 53 countries. AFT also in-licensed a significant number of products and has a growing number of existing R&D programmes.

Source: https://investors.aftpharm.com/

NAPA, CA -Jan. 31, 2023/PRNewswire — CropX Technologies, a global leader in digital solutions for agronomic farm management, today announced its acquisition of Tule Technologies, a precision irrigation company based in California. This acquisition brings new data capture technologies to the CropX Agronomic Farm Management System and expands its market in California drip-irrigated specialty crops.

The CropX system offers its users real-time mobile and desktop insights and advice on irrigation, disease control, nutrient management and more, based on above-ground crop sensing data and below-ground soil monitoring. Tule brings a complementary new mode of data collection from above the plant canopy that precisely determines crop water use, which will enhance CropX’s artificial intelligence predictions, recommendations and automations, and add to its solutions for drip-irrigated specialty crops such as tree-nuts and vineyards.   

“We are excited to welcome Tule to CropX, expanding our offerings to our customers to solve agronomic problems. With Tule’s canopy data incorporated into the CropX system, CropX is adding a new and powerful dimension to the world’s most complete precision irrigation solution,” said Tomer Tzach, CEO of CropX Technologies.

Effective immediately, all Tule employees will join CropX, adding expansive on-farm and client service expertise in the specialty crop and drip irrigation space, as well as technology talent to CropX’s growing global team. 

“At Tule, we’ve admired CropX for their agronomic expertise, engineering excellence, and global ambition,” said Dr. Tom Shapland, CEO of Tule Technologies. “We couldn’t be more thrilled to join the CropX team.”

The acquisition comes at a time of increasing demand for precise watering technologies in agriculture. “The farming industry is at the frontlines of global challenges to balance food security with water and other natural resources,” said Dr. John Gates, Senior Vice President and Global Head of Product at CropX. “We are committed to helping our customers manage water confidently and efficiently with technology. Tule’s unique tech and vast experience with California vineyards and orchards are a perfect fit.” 

This is the fourth acquisition CropX has made since 2020 and the second US-based company. CropX acquired Nebraska-based CropMetrics in the first quarter (Q1) of 2020, New Zealand-based Regen in Q4 of 2020, and Netherlands-based Dacom Farm Intelligence in Q3 2021, in each case adding expertise, technologies, customers, data and expanding markets.  CropX will do the same with Tule working to incorporate the team and technology into an easy-to-use yet powerful agronomic farm management system. The final results being a more robust solution to more farmers and enabling a sustainable and connected agriculture industry.

About Tule Technologies 

Founded in 2014 with backing from Y-Combinator and others, Tule (pronounced “too-lee”) combines proprietary technology, agronomic expertise, and cutting-edge artificial intelligence to provide farmers with irrigation decision support solutions. Their unique in-field sensor, developed at the University of California, Davis, is the only commercially-available device for measuring Actual Evapotranspiration (i.e., the water use of a farm field). The company’s customers include the winemakers who tend to coastal California’s most prized vineyards to the agronomists who farm thousands of acres of tree crops in California’s inland valleys. 

Kaibot, the small New Zealand AI-enabled learning robot designed to help five-15-year-old children learn to code, will launch this week at the Future Education Technology Conference (FETC) in New Orleans.  

The Kiwi-designed robot and its online platform Kaibot in Kainundrum has already won acclaim, taking out the Learn-to-Code category in the Smart Toys Competition in Dubai 2023, and being named as a finalist in the DA top EdTech product of the year award for 2023.

Over the next three months, Kaibot will be put through its paces in front of thousands of teachers throughout the US.

Such is the level of interest in Kaibot that influential tech educators will be participating in workshops and professional development seminars featuring Kaibot at FETC and other educational events throughout the US this year.

Founder Bruce Jackson says that he’s excited to get Kaibot in front of the education community for real hands-on demonstration.

“Kaibot is designed to make learning to code, fun, intuitive and challenging, and to hold the attention of the youngest school children through to more capable teenage coders.

“I'm a firm believer that coding is an essential skill, just like reading and math. Even if you don’t want to get into a computer science role in the future, a basic understanding of code will be useful even in traditional fields, even if you're going to be a doctor or a lawyer,” Jackson says.

Kaibot is unique in the way it blends coding, learning, and 3D visualization to create a fun and engaging learning experience that can be scaled up in complexity as the child learns.  

The innovative palm-sized black and blue robot is coded using a deck of cards with commands printed on them - Kaibot scans the sequence of cards and then plays back what’s been scanned, allowing it to participate in races and challenges.

The robot can be operated entirely without using a computer screen if desired, or with the addition of its online platform, Kaibot in Kainundrum, its exploits can be viewed in an interactive 3D environment on a computer or iPad, allowing the use of block-based coding and the ability to develop their own games using lasers, gates and mirrors.

The beauty of Kaibot is that this allows the educator to choose the amount of technology that is brought into play, depending on the age and stage of the participant, using a blend of the physical and the digital worlds.

A unique feature is the ability to use braille-imprinted coding cards meaning that blind, or hard-of-sight students are also able to participate in coding education and fun challenges.

“We wanted an inclusive product, no matter what difficulties the child may be facing. No matter what gender, or if they’re visually impaired, or hearing-impaired, we want to improve education equity,” Jackson says.

Leading educators are already impressed by Kaibot and Konundrum and are developing comprehensive learning plans featuring the robot. Some will be presenting these plans at workshops and professional development seminars at FETC and other shows throughout the US.

One leading academic in this field, Rudy Neufeld, CEO, President and Senior Author at Neufeld Learning Systems Inc. has published a 260-page resource; “First Steps in Coding through Mathematical Thinking and Game-Based Learning” - which presents lesson plans and suggested activities utilising Kaibot for beginners to advanced learners in coding from concrete to the abstract.

“Robots engage the minds of students in rich, exploratory, open-ended enquiries, thereby creating, ‘Communities of Innovation’, as students work together and share their explorations and findings,” says Neufeld.

“The processes of understanding how to code takes the learner through a rich field of mathematical concepts. When you create code, you are speaking mathematics. In coding, one teaches a robot which then gives feedback, to reflect the thinking by giving a visual, concrete result,” he says.

Jackson’s passion for robotics and coding began 5 years ago, when he took his son along to a school open-day that promised an introduction to coding. He discovered that there weren’t actually the kind of interactive learning devices available on the market to make it easy to teach coding to youngsters – so, he set out to create his own.

His first product ‘Kai’s Clan’ broke new ground, creating a STEAM toolbox for students 8+ years old, also winning International Product Awards. Kai’s Clan is a great ‘next-step’ resource for educators and kids who’ve done a little bit of scratch/blockly in the classroom. When Covid hit, Jackson and his team took the time to expand – KaiBot was conceived.

Ronel Schodt, Kai's Education, Sales and Marketing Manager says that with computer science and digital technologies now becoming a compulsory part of the curriculum right around the world, that means the potential for KaiBot is enormous.

“We are very excited to be attending FETC and finally revealing Kaibot to the world,” she says. 

“FETC attracts the most dynamic and innovative education leaders and professionals from around the world and is known as the best place to engage with the thought leaders who are leading the charge in classrooms.

“The level of support we’ve received is incredible and we can’t wait to meet everyone and let Kaibot show what it can do,” she says.

(ends)

 For more information, contact:

PR Representative, Paul Blomfield, paul@paulblomfield.com PH: 021 970 871

Ronel Schodt, Kai's Education, Sales and Marketing Manager, ronel@kaisclan.ai PH: +64 21 746 871

Delta will debut a Los Angeles-Auckland service in October, bringing much-needed competition to the route.

The airline will operate daily flights between from October 28 using an Airbus A350-900 aircraft, it announced today.

The giant US carrier will take on Air New Zealand as the only airline flying the Auckland-Los Angeles route non-stop, although there are some indirect services through the Pacific. Passengers have complained of high prices on Los Angeles route and Delta becomes the only US airline on the routes.

American Airlines didn’t reinstate the Auckland-Los Angeles services it ran before the pandemic.

Delta will have more than 1750 weekly flights to 85 destinations around the globe this northern summer and has just been named the most punctual airline in the US.

“With brand-new flights this year to cities like Auckland, Geneva and London-Gatwick, we’re giving customers more options to enjoy the premium experience and elevated hospitality they have come to know and expect from us,” said Joe Esposito, Delta’s senior vice president of network planning.

Delta operates more than 150 daily flights from Los Angeles to 53 destinations across the globe as the airport’s leading premium global carrier.

“LAX continues to grow its global network of destinations that are connecting Angelenos to every corner of the globe, and Delta’s addition of nonstop service from Los Angeles to New Zealand is in lockstep with the airline’s commitment to expand and improve service to our region,” said Justin Erbacci, chief executive officer of Los Angeles World Airports.

Delta offers connections to 45 cities in the America’s through Los Angeles.

Auckland Airport’s chief executive, Carrie Hurihanganui, said Delta’s announcement was a wonderful way to start the year

“Los Angeles has always been a popular choice for Kiwi travellers, either heading to experience the best of California, or to destinations across the United States and beyond. It’s also real a vote of confidence in New Zealand as a high-quality travel and tourism destination. ‘‘

North America is the country’s second largest inbound market, after Australia.

The airline says on flights between Auckland and LAX, customers have a choice of three cabin types from economy to a business class offering with a lie-flat seat.

For the second year in a row, Delta earned a top Cirium award for global operational excellence. The award reflects Delta’s operational complexity, and the exemplary work of Delta people to achieve on-time performance while limiting the impact of disruption to its customers.

Delta was the most on-time North American airline in 2022. Of Delta’s 1,004,684 flights last year tracked by Cirium, 83.63 per cent arrived on time, Cirium reported.

Delta has more than 90,000 staff and has more than 4000 daily flights to more than 275 destinations on six continents. It flies 200 million customers a year.

The entry of Delta to the Los Angeles route will follow head-to head competition on another of Air NZ’s prized services: Auckland to New York. Qantas has announced plans to start flying that route from the middle of the year.

And more capacity is being added to mainland China routes now that country has eased Covid-19 restrictions. It is expected that by April 50 per cent of pre-pandemic capacity will be re-instated. Flights to, and through China, on carriers China Southern and China Eastern will further increase competition on longhaul routes and put downward pressure on fares.

Source: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/