SriLankan targets 16 % revenue growth

Indunil Hewage

National carrier SriLankan Airlines targets a 16 % growth in revenue terms by doubling the amount of passengers it carries a year by 2015. SriLankan Airlines carries around 3.5 million passengers annually and doubling the amount of passengers in the coming years will definitely be an enormous challenge. However, SriLankan Airlines believes that it can tweak the yields up and derive revenues as a result of fast growing air traffic segment, said Kapila Chandrasena, CEO SriLankan Airlines. He made these observations speaking at the Second International Air Transport Association (IATA) Global Aviation Human Capital Summit in Colombo.

SriLankan Airlines Chairman Nishantha Wickramasinghe delivering the inaugural speech at the Second IATA Global Aviation Human Capital Summit Picture by –Roshan Pitipana

Chandrasena noted that SriLankan Airlines will break even somewhere in 2015 under its five year growth strategy plan. SriLankan Airlines is currently focused on core businesses and it has plans to improve complementary businesses to be revenue lines for the company. These measures are expected to give operational efficiencies thereby generating more revenues for SriLankan Airlines.

“The aviation market itself is a challenge and we are facing challenges with cost drivers which are something beyond our control.

The airline industry is today going through a fairly testing time. When the prices of operation are going up, prices of tickets are coming down. We need to reconcile these things, which I believe is a challenging task.

SriLankan Airlines has also put a great emphasis on human resources development activities to overcome various issues faced by the industry. “Today air travel remains a growth market. Every 15 years, air traffic has doubled and we will foresee this trend for the next 15 years.”

Chandrasena noted that the world traffic which is recording a 4.8% growth a year will provide enormous opportunities for SriLankan Airlines to build a sustainable airline.

We are currently undertaking both modernization and expansion of fleets and looking at the sectors we need to fly and new traffic profiles to determine what type of aircraft we need to acquire in the future. SriLankan Airlines is also in the process of streamlining all aspects of its operations thereby getting the required efficiencies particularly in the human skills development segment to supplement the local aviation market.

SriLankan Airlines Chairman Nishantha Wickramasinghe said that SriLankan Airlines is set to become the Centre for Excellence in the region in the aviation industry related training and human resources development activities.