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One of the biggest airlines in the world had a very good year. Qatar Airways Group reported earnings Tuesday and said it set a record for its 27 years of operation: QAR6.1 billion ($1.7 billion) on QAR81 billion.
The state-owned carrier said numbers were going up across the board. Its collective divisions ferried 40 million passengers, up 26% from the year before. Despite increasing capacity, its revenue from those passengers was up 19% from last year on a record 83% sellout rate.
“This latest remarkable annual performance demonstrates Qatar Airways Group’s flexibility and resilience in successfully navigating a constantly evolving global travel industry, and indicates a strong and sustained rebound from the challenges faced by the sector in recent years,” said Saad Bin Sharida Al-Kaabi, Qatar’s minister of energy and chairman of Qatar Airways Group, in a statement.
Though many airlines have been complaining about delays in getting their hands on Boeing 737 Max planes, Qatar Airways bragged about how many they got into operation over the last fiscal year.
“Qatar Airways introduced nine Boeing [737 Max 8] aircraft into service in May 2023, taking just three months to implement,” the airline said in its annual report, which accompanied the earnings announcement, attributing the speed to the completion of a new in-house flight school. “This was an exceptional feat given that normal implementation timelines, in terms of Boeing and industry standards typically require 15 months for this process.”