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ATM 2016: Turkish Airlines confident of $12b sales target

Dubai - Carrier eyes to increase its global industry market share by over 100% to 5% by 2023

Turkish Airline expects to achieve more than $12 billion sales target in 2016 and also aims to increase its global aviation industry market share by more than 100 per cent to five per cent by 2023.
This was revealed by the airline's chief marketing officer Ahmet Olmustur at the Arabian Travel Market on Tuesday in Dubai. Last year, the airline surpassed the billion-dollar level for its net profit.
The airline has 482 weekly flights from the Middle East. Of these, 193 weekly flights are from the GCC. He said the airline has a very strong GCC presence and growth is coming mainly from the UAE and Oman.
"We have witnessed growth in the GCC and the Middle East last year has been very good, as we ramp up utilisation and add new aircraft to our fleet. Our capacity increase in the GCC was mainly driven by growth from Oman and the UAE," Olmustur said.
Talking about the expansion plans, he said the airline will be inducting 25 new planes by the end of 2016.
"We are excited about our expansion plans as we aim to increase our existing market share of 2 per cent in the global aviation industry to 5 per cent by 2023," he said.
The airline expects an overall capacity increase of 16 per cent over last year.
Referring to the Middle East, Olmustur also stated that the first quarter this year saw an increase in capacity by 16 per cent in the GCC markets and 18 per cent in the Middle East countries as travellers from the region looked at 24 new routes that were added last year to the Turkish Airlines network of 285 destinations.
Olmustur said: "With growing market presence and phenomenal customer uptake, we plan to increase our capacity this year by offering more flights, destinations and increased frequencies to our growing loyal customer base."
"We are excited about our expansion plans as we aim to increase our existing market share of two per cent in the global aviation industry to 5 per cent by 2023," he said.
Turkish Airlines is also expanding its route network in 2016, starting May, with Atlanta, its ninth destination in the USA, and Bogota and Panama, to further reach into Latin America and to Dubrovnik in Croatia. The airline will also start flying directly to Hanoi in June 2016.
Globally, the number of passengers is projected to rise to 72.4 million, up from 61.2 million last year consisting of 31.6 million domestic and 40.8 million international travellers. The airline is also expecting to grow to 186 billion seat kilometres in 2016.
- abdulbasit@khaleejtimes.com