By Aduragbemi Omiyale
In the first six months of the 2024-25 financial year of Emirates Group, a net profit of AED 9.3 billion ($2.5 billion) was recorded, with the pre-tax profit growing to AED 10.4 billion ($ 2.8 billion).
Also, the revenue went up by 5 per cent to AED 70.8 billion ($19.3 billion) from the AED 67.3 billion ($18.3 billion) recorded in the same period of last year, reflecting the consistently strong customer demand across business divisions, and across regions.
“We expect customer demand to remain strong for the rest of 2024-25, and we look forward to increasing our capacity to grow revenues as new aircraft join the Emirates fleet and new facilities come online at dnata. The outlook is positive, but we don’t intend to rest on our laurels.
“We will stay agile in deploying our capacity and resources in a dynamic marketplace,” the chief executive of the organisation, Mr Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, stated.
“The Group has surpassed its record performance of last year to deliver a fantastic result for the first half of 2024-25. This again illustrates the power of our proven business model working in combination with Dubai’s growth trajectory as a city of choice to live, work, visit, connect through, and do business in,” he added.
It was observed that apart from demonstrating strong operating profitability, Emirates maintained a robust EBITDA of AED 20.4 billion ($5.6 billion), slightly lower than AED 20.6 billion ($5.6 billion) last year.
The firm posted a solid cash position of AED 43.7 billion ($11.9 billion) as of September 30, 2024, compared with the AED 47.1 billion ($12.8 billion) achieved on March 31, 2024.
Emirates has been able to tap on its own strong cash reserves to support business needs, including payments for new freighter aircraft orders and other debt payments, also paying AED 2 billion in dividends to its owner, as declared at the end of its 2023-24 financial year.
“The group’s strong profitability enables us to make the investments necessary for our continued success. We’re investing billions of dollars to bring new products and services to the market for our customers; to implement advanced technologies and other innovation projects to drive growth; and to look after our employees who work hard every day to ensure our customers’ safety and satisfaction,” the chief executive stated.
Emirates continued to enhance its network and increase connectivity options through its Dubai hub. During the first half of 2024-25, Emirates increased scheduled flights to 8 cities: Amsterdam, Cebu, Clark, Luanda, Lyon, Madrid, Manila and Singapore.
In May, Emirates restarted daily services to Phnom Penh in Cambodia via Singapore. In June, it launched daily services to Bogotá via Miami, expanding the airline’s South American presence to Colombia. In September, Emirates opened a new route to Madagascar via the Seychelles – taking its passenger and cargo network to 148 airports in 80 countries by September 30.
Expanding connectivity options for customers, during the first six months of 2024-25, Emirates entered into new agreements with 7 codeshare, interline, and intermodal partners: AirPeace, Avianca, BLADE, ITA Airways, Iceland Air, SNCF Railway, and Viva Aerobus.
Modupe Gbadeyanka