The company planned to reach the breakthrough point and to start making profit in 2015, Erikas Zubrus, Air Lituanica CEO, said at a news conference on Wednesday.
He told BNS that the airline industry was generally characterized by low profit margins, and the company’s business plan showed that in 2015, its profit margin would reach between 1 and 3 percent of its turnover.
“The carrier’s revenues should exceed 250 million litas at that time,” Zubrus told BNS.
Simonas Bartkus, the company’s director of commerce, said at the news conference that Air Lituanica planned to offer direct flights to six destinations and carry around 70,000 passengers this year.
Flights to Brussels will be launched on June 30 and on July 8, the company will add Amsterdam to its flight schedule, he says adding that later the company would roll out flights to Berlin, Prague, Munich, and Moscow.
The carrier will operate two aircrafts – a 76-seat Embraer 170 and an 86-seat Embraer 175. One aircraft will be leased from an Embraer subsidiary and another one, from Estonian Air. Both aircrafts should be delivered to the airport of Vilnius late in June.
The local authority of Vilnius owns 83 percent of shares in Air Lituanica through the company Start Vilnius. Air Lituanica Club, which groups private investors, holds the remaining 17 percent.
