BETTER USE, BETTER NUMBERS

All the airlines in the Lufthansa Group profited in the first quarter of the year from improved capacity steering and, as expected, lifted the utilization of their aircraft in comparison with the year-earlier level. The Lufthansa Group raised the seat load factor in passenger traffic by 1.9 percentage points year-on-year to 76.1%. The cargo load factor rose by 0.6 percentage points to 70.5%. Due to the Group-wide 2.7% reduction in capacity (in terms of available seat kilometres), the number of passengers carried by Lufthansa German Airlines, SWISS and Austrian Airlines in the period from January through March fell by 2.3% on the prior-year level to 21.6 million. Sales (revenue seat kilometres) in the same term were down by 0.1%, but remained virtually stable. Accordingly, the reduction in capacity led to an improved utilization. Lufthansa German Airlines raised its seat load factor in the first quarter by 1.7 percentage points to 75.5%. In the period January through March, the airline reduced capacity by three percent. The decline in sales was limited simultaneously to 0.8%. The Lufthansa passenger count fell by 1.9% to 15.5 million. SWISS improved the passenger load factor in the first quarter by 2.4 percentage points to 79.8%. The Swiss carrier raised capacity in the first three months by 1.9%, sales rose over-proportionately by 4.9%. The number of passengers carried by SWISS in the first quarter totalled 3.8 million. The passenger count fell by 3.4% owing largely to fewer flights. Austrian Airlines scaled back capacity by 9.4%. The fall in sales was contained at a disproportionate 5.2%. Thanks to capacity steering, Austrian Airlines improved the seat load factor in the first quarter by 3.3 percentage points to 74.0%. Passenger numbers at Austrian Airlines in the first three months were down on the year-earlier level by 2.7% to 2.3 million. The Lufthansa Group’s financial results for the first quarter 2013 will be published on May 2, 2013. Check out http://www.lufthansa.com for more.