Japan Airlines Corp. said Tuesday it will put off submitting a detailed business turnaround plan to the Tokyo District Court until the end of August because it needs more time to come up with an effective restructuring strategy.
The plan was to have been submitted in late June.
"We will carefully study (the details of the plan) and create a structure that will make the company profitable, and by reflecting this in the plan, we hope it will lead to the revival of the JAL group," JAL President Masaru Onishi said at a news conference.
Appearing at the same news conference, Hideo Seto, trustee of the Enterprise Turnaround Initiative Corp. of Japan, which is overseeing the airline's rehabilitation, said the two-month delay is aimed at enabling JAL to thoroughly review its route network and will please potential lenders.
JAL Chairman Kazuo Inamori offered his assurance that JAL will not engage in wasting taxpayers' money or "sloppy management" so it can repay the public for saving the airline.
The court accepted JAL's request for the delay.
Job cuts and route reductions form the key pillars of the turnaround plan. When JAL filed Jan. 19 for bankruptcy protection, it said it would scrap 31 unprofitable international and domestic routes and improve its cost structure by cutting around 16,000 jobs.
In late April, JAL unveiled a new plan for 45 route cuts from late September through next March as part of efforts to swiftly restore profitability. Tuesday's announcement came amid creditor banks' insistence that JAL make further personnel and flight cuts.