Air New Zealand, has announced a spectacular result for the 2015 year ending June 30th posting a normalised earnings before taxation of NZ$496 million (US$322 million) an increase of 49 per cent on the prior year. Statutory net profit after taxation was NZ$327 million, an increase of 24 per cent.
For the airline all the right numbers were on the up while costs were down.
While the reduced price of fuel (NZ$119 million) helped the profit lift it was more a combination of many factors that the airline has been working on for the past four years.
Chief executive officer Christopher Luxon told Airlineratings.com that “a continued focus on superior commercial results, enhancing the customer experience and further developing the airline’s people and culture have resulted in a terrific 2015 financial year across all three of these commitments.”
“We remain focused on the Pacific Rim as our growth strategy and will continue to provide the best connections, product and service at competitive prices, to maintain and grow our market share in these regions,” he said.
Mr Luxon said that next year “will see further capacity growth in international markets as we look forward to new routes starting in December 2015 to Houston and Buenos Aires.”
And in a warning to the airline competitors he added that “while we are gearing up to launch these exciting new routes we have a team assessing potential new opportunities in Australia, Asia and the Americas.”
Mr Luxon said that the airline has spent considerable time and effort enhancing the on-the-ground and in-flight experience in 2015 financial year.
“This has resulted in a further lift in customer satisfaction including amongst our most frequent flyers, and has seen the airline receive many awards in the past year.”
The airline will retire its last Boeing 767 early next year and its last Boeing 737-300 late this year. And all of the airline’s Boeing 777-200ERs will be configured to the new interior product by December.
Over the next four years Air New Zealand will buy NZ$2.60 billion worth on new more economical planes to replace older models and for expansion.
Air New Zealand’s loyalty programme, Airpoints, continues to grow at pace with around 1.9 million members now, which is up almost 17 percent on the previous year.
Mr Luzon said that a cornerstone focus for Air New Zealand in 2015 financial year was knowing its customers better than ever before through the enhanced use of data and analytics.
“Air New Zealand will deliver more personalised and relevant offers to its customers in the future through the use of data and analytics. We have the systems, people and global partners in place to see the airline be more relevant than ever in our customers’ lives and in turn to deliver even more commercially through the Airpoints programme,” said Mr Luxon.
