Jet Airways' Q3 operating profit at Rs.3 crore

Jet Airways Group Friday reported an operating profit of Rs.3 crore for the quarter ended Dec 31, 2014 from a loss of Rs.284 crore in the corresponding quarter of last fiscal.

This is the first time that the company has posted profits after seven consecutive quarters of losses.

"At the beginning of FY15 we outlined a three-year turnaround plan to get Jet Airways back to profitability. Today our business performance provides hard evidence that we are turning the business around and are on track to achieve our targets," said Cramer Ball, chief executive, Jet Airways.

"It is pleasing to report that we have achieved significant growth in all the major KPIs (key performance indicators) in a very competitive environment."

According to Ball, while the global and local operating conditions have eased, the company expect to see the real impact of the lower fuel price in the next quarter.

The airline's total revenue increased by nine percent or Rs.446 crore and stood at Rs.5,436 crore in the quarter under review from Rs.4,990 crore in the corresponding quarter of last fiscal.

The company said that its passenger traffic during the quarter under review grew by 10.4 percent and stood at 5.8 million from 5.3 million passengers ferried during the quarter ended Dec 31, 2013.

The company's passenger revenues for the third quarter rose by 8.8 percent to Rs.4,621 crore from Rs.4,248 crore in the quarter ended Dec 31, 2013.

Cargo revenue was up by 5.3 percent to Rs.382 crore from Rs.363 crore during the corresponding quarter of last fiscal.

The airline said that this improvement has been as a result of optimising the network to have tighter domestic and international network integration, synergies with partner carriers, implementing a consistent, full service, single brand strategy across the entire domestic airline operation.

"This was an important quarter for us as we commenced the roll out of our single brand full service product on all flights across our domestic network," Ball said.

"The enhanced global connectivity we now offer along with our partner Etihad Airways and other strategic codeshares has helped in a sustained increase in our international passenger traffic."