Swiss International Air Lines Posts Profit of £90.7 Million

Apparently Swiss International Air Lines has just recently made an operating profit of CHF146 million in 2009, or £90.7 million. Although the airline did post a profit, it was still CHF326million below what the airline made in 2008.

The Swiss airline carried 13.8 million passengers in 2009. This is an increase on the 13.5 million that flew with the airline in the previous year. The Swiss International Air Lines manager, Gregor Koncilja, said that they are very pleased to count themselves as one of the few airlines that was able to post a profit for all of 2009. This achievement allows Swiss International to continue to invest in their products and services.

Swiss International Air Lines launched a six times daily flight from Heathrow to Geneva in January. It plans to increase the capacity on its Manchester to Zurich route starting in April. Overall, all of these routes have started to pick up pretty well for the carrier.

Mr Koncilja said that he thought it was the right moment for the airline to add these new routes. He did warn, however, that Heathrow was unlikely to see much expansion this year. Instead, Swiss International Air Lines will concentrate on its regional airports, Manchester and Birmingham. The traffic out of the London region has slightly declined because of the financial and banking sector. Thus, they would rather move capacity into the other regions. This is where they saw substantial growth over all of 2009. They expect that this will be something that continues into 2010 and beyond.

Mr Koncilja finished up by saying that increasing capacity in these areas is the overall goal. As soon as the demand is there, they can enforce it through other areas as well.