Azernews.Az

By Trend

Azerbaijani low-cost airline Buta Airways will reach break-even point by the end of 2018, the Rusaviainsider portal reports with reference to the representative of the airline.

Buta Airways, which performed its first commercial flight on September 1, 2017, is confident that the project will quickly become a success story.

"Ten months is too short of a period to talk about large incomes. Both AZAL (Azerbaijan Airlines, the national carrier) and Buta Airways successfully organize transit traffic flows, managing the synergy of their route networks. It also serves the common goal of turning the Baku Heydar Aliyev airport into an international passenger hub," the portal reports referring to the company's representative.

Buta Airways' representative said the project would've been hypothetically economically viable, even if it was independent of AZAL's support.

"The project proved to be quite popular and commercially reasonable," said the representative.

Buta Airways fleet consists of seven Embraer aircraft - six E190 and one E170, which will soon be replaced by E190. The eighth aircraft of this type are planned to be added to the airline's fleet by mid-2019.

At the end of 2017 (after four months of operation), the low-cost airline served 92,000 passengers. The results of 1Q2018 showed an increase to 104,000 passengers.

In its summer schedule IATA 2018 Buta Airways operates flights to 12 destinations in Russia, Ukraine, Turkey, Bulgaria and Georgia.

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