SpiceJet, Kingfisher Expect to Break Even This Financial Year

Mumbai: Indian budget carrier SpiceJet Ltd. and Kingfisher Airlines Ltd. said Wednesday they expect to break even this financial year.
"It (the break-even) will be backed by our business plan, which primarily includes higher utilization of our capacity," chief commercial officer, Samyukth Sridharan, told reporters on the sidelines of an industry conference.
"We also see fuel prices stabilizing this year," Mr. Sridharan said.
SpiceJet narrowed its net loss for the financial fourth-quarter ended March 31, mainly due to lower fuel prices and a reversal of foreign currency losses.
The carrier had a net loss of 78.2 million rupees ($1.63 million) for the quarter, compared with a net loss of 1.2 billion rupees a year earlier.
"The passenger increase compared to last year will be very high, since we had cut capacity at this time last year," Mr. Sridharan said.
Indian carriers cut capacity last year by deferring the delivery of new planes or withdrawing existing flights as the global economic downturn reduced demand for air travel.
SpiceJet, which operates a fleet of 19 Boeing Co. aircraft, expects to take delivery of three more Boeing planes by December 2010, starting in February, Mr. Sridharan said.
Kingfisher Airlines also expects to break even this financial year, a senior company executive said.
"This is based on our business projection and is in line with the industry looking up this year," the executive, who didn't wish to be named, said.
Kingfisher Airlines and its low-fare brand - Kingfisher Red - together operate 375 flights daily and "that will remain more or less the same this year," the executive said.
"We have no aircraft deliveries coming in this year," the executive said, adding that the airline currently has a load factor of about 70%.
Kingfisher has a fleet of 74 planes, mainly from the Airbus A320 family.
01/07/09 Anirban Chowdhury/Wall Street Journal

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Categories: Kingfisher Jul 2009, SpiceJet Jul 2009