Air Serbia registers first ever Q1 profit
Air Serbia recorded a net profit during the first quarter of the year for the first time since launching operations under its new name in 2013. Although the carrier did not specify the amount of money it made during what is traditionally the slowest quarter for the aviation industry, its CEO, Jiri Marek, told “Bloomberg Adria”, “We launched many new routes, primarily destinations for leisure travel and the diaspora. This quick reaction brought us to profitability, that is the first profit after Covid, which amounted to 21 million euros [in 2022]. What is particularly important to us is that we continued on that path in the first quarter of this year. I am quite optimistic about the future”.
Commenting on the months ahead, Mr Marek said in a separate interview that this year is performing above the company’s initial expectations. “Despite the very ambitious growth in operations in 2022, we planned further growth for 2023. We started the year with an extremely positive trend and are currently recording an increase in the number of passengers even compared to pre-pandemic levels. We reached and surpassed our historic record results in terms of the total number of passengers handled, but also in terms of the average cabin occupancy. At this point, we are confident that 2023 will exceed our initial expectations, which were otherwise very ambitious to begin with”, Mr Marek said.
As previously reported, Air Serbia handled 654.959 passengers during the first quarter of 2023. Once April figures are included, the airline’s passenger numbers have increased an average of 20% compared to the same period in 2019. “Earlier we said our goal was to handle over three million passengers this year, but now, for the first time, we can say that our goal is to reach three and a half million passengers”, the carrier’s CEO noted. Despite the strong results so far, the Serbian airline has been experiencing fleet issues over the past three weeks due to unexpected maintenance of its aircraft which is taking longer than usual to complete, forcing it to conclude short-term wet-leases. “The situation on the market is very volatile and complex, especially due to the increased number of strikes by stakeholders within the aviation industry - beginning with various airport service providers, air traffic control… but also due to a continuous disruption in the supply chain of spare parts and other equipment. Therefore, the necessary period for the procurement of individual spare parts is now measured in months rather than weeks as was previously the case”, Mr Marek concluded.
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