Last year’s revenue stood at a little more than EUR65 million, down on the year. In 2010, the carrier posted revenue of EUR69 million, according to the Finance Ministry website data.
“We are now getting ready to introduce the Boeing 737-300 aircraft in our fleet. The first such plane will start operation at the end of April and will be used for Italian routes mainly,” said Paula Ardelean, marketing and sales manager of the airline. The aircraft will be leased and more will be put in service as the company phases out smaller planes, she added.
Carpatair was established by Nicolae Petrov twelve years ago and soon important businessmen like IKEA’s Ingvar Kamprad and Moritz Suter, the founder of Crossair, became shareholders in it.
Carpatair, which operates several hundred flights a week to 30 destinations in six countries, is a regular airline like Tarom, Air France and the Lufthansa group, competing over a market estimated at EUR400 million, not including low-cost operators.
The company plans to introduce flights from Chisinau (Republic of Moldova), once the country signs the agreement to join the Common Aviation Area, which should have happened in March but was postponed until June.
Carpatair increased the number of routes last year when it added flights to ten international destinations in Ukraine, the Republic of Moldova, Italy and Greece via the hub in Timisoara.
State-owned airline Tarom last year carried 2.19 million passengers, below the numbers expected, and 510,000 fewer than the Hungarian-held low cost airline Wizz Air, which thus became the largest carrier on the Romanian market. Wizz Air officials said it carried 2.7 million people in 2011.
The third largest operator on the local market, low-cost airline Blue Air carried less than 1.5 million people in 2011. The Lufthansa group, comprised of Lufthansa bmi, Austrian Airlines and Swiss, announced it carried 1.1 million people to and from Romania, up from 1 million in 2010.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)