March 3, 2008 - BRITISH premium-only operator Silverjet has bounced back from a tough start to the year, announcing a February load factor of 64 per cent, up 10 per cent on the previous month.

The airline, which offers the Mezzo turnkey IFE service on the Boeing 767s it operates from London Luton to New York Newark and Dubai, offered 13,800 revenue seats last month and sold 8,829 of them.

“Forward bookings remain strong for both our New York and Dubai service,” chief executive Lawrence Hunt said today. “We continue to see a very high number of repeat customers – on our New York service over 25 per cent of customers are now repeat bookers. Our Dubai service continues to go from strength to strength and is ahead of expectations.”

Silverjet is widely perceived as having a fight on its hands following the decision by US-based premium-only Eos, which carries IMS handhelds, to go head-to-head with the British operation on London-New York Newark and London-Dubai. It has also seen a £10 million equity injection slip through its fingers, with the potential investor citing changed market conditions (Inflight Online, February 20).

Nothing daunted, the carrier expects to turn the corner next month. “The board is making every effort to ensure that Silverjet will achieve its first month of operating profit and be cash-generative in March 2008,” said Hunt.

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