Romanian national airline Tarom plans to switch on profit from 2015, when it estimates 92 million lei (some 20.824 million euros) in profit, as well as to cut the personnel by 10 percent by year-end, company CEO Christian Heinzmann told a press conference on Thursday, Agerpres reports.

'The management plan we present today estimates a switch on profit from 2015, when we will have 92 million lei in profit, with the figure to grow up to 173 million lei by 2016, as well as an increase in the number of passengers and occupancy rate. Moreover, we seek a cut in personnel on a voluntary basis by a total 2,000 staff or by 10 percent by the end of this year', the Tarom CEO said on the occasion of the presentation of the management plan, unveiled by the new private Tarom management selected at the end of 2012.

The airline mainly targets to ensure the financial sustainability, after it cuts losses and turns to profit.

Thus, the 2013 losses will be cut to 143 million lei, as compared to a loss originally put at 252 million lei. The company losses in 2014 will amount to only 18 million lei, and Tarom will start making profit from 2015 at 92 million lei and such figure will go up to 173 million lei in 2016.

Tarom flights are currently 64-65 percent occupied as compared to some 75 percent European average.

The current company managers target an occupancy rate of 75 percent by 2016 and 2.6 million passengers flown a year as compared to 2.3 million the company anticipates it will carry this year.

'We want to introduce a new marketing strategy, at the same time with a new route system. Furthermore, we will renegotiate some slots (or flight schedules - editor's note) so as to carry out only profitable flights. We are to even out the IT systems and also to cut the personnel by 10 percent by a voluntarily-stepping down programmes', Heinzmann explained.

He announced that one of the most important measures Tarom will take is to make the international flight fleet uniform.

'We want to make the fleet for the international flights uniform, by renting only one type of aircraft, which will cut both the maintenance and the training and fuel costs a lot. There will probably be two types of aircraft, the jet type for the international flights and turbo-propeller for the company's domestic flights. We'll draw up a specification in three months at the most so as to see what costs such a thing implies. It is possible that we'd have a barter-type contract with an aircraft producer, by which it should take up the present fleet and we'll rent those planes from it', the Tarom Administration Council chairman Dan Pascariu said.

Other measures taken by the airline in order to make its activity profitable also include using the Technical Division to draw foreign funds, abandoning the direct operation of the charter flights by an independent Tarom division and reorganising the routes.

Source: bne