On 3 April 2012 the new SWISS Arrival Lounge at Zurich Airport opens its doors. The luxurious 700 sq. m. lounge offers arriving passengers a wide range of services including facilities for working, relaxation and freshening up.

Located in the public area of Arrivals 2 at Zurich Airport, the lounge is readily accessible within a few minutes of landing and particularly appealing for passengers coming off long-haul flights. The lounge is fitted with state-of-the-art equipment and features elegant SWISS design. A distinctive limestone wall from the Jura Mountains of Switzerland and suitably stylish furniture combine to create an appealing atmosphere.

The SWISS Arrival Lounge’s impressively spacious refresh facilities include 20 showers, from which it is possible to order an ironing service with the press of a button. Three hotel-style bedrooms, one with a private bathroom, round out the features of this attractive facility. Lounge users with a thirst to quench or hunger to satisfy will find the bistro area offers an extensive buffet with a wide selection of cold and warm breakfast dishes along with fresh juices and a choice of coffees. The adjacent lounge area is furnished with comfortable Vitra seats and enhanced by a comprehensive selection of newspapers and magazines. Guests wishing to get some work done will be able to take advantage of the 10 work stations and free W-LAN. Guests also have a private telephone cubicle at their disposal where they make calls undisturbed.

The Arrival Lounge, which is open daily from 05:45 to 13:00 and replaces the former Arrival Lounge in Arrivals 1, is available to SWISS status customers, SWISS Business and First Class passengers and Star Gold members.

Swiss International Air Lines Ltd. Corporate Communications, 2 April 2012

SWISS will be providing daily non-stop service between Zurich and Newark (for New York) using its own Airbus A340-300 equipment from 31 March. The new arrangement provides a total of 219 seats per flight in a three-class cabin configuration. SWISS thus now offers three daily non-stop connections between Zurich and New York.

By introducing its own Airbus A340-300 equipment for its Newark services, SWISS is increasing capacity by some 33% on its Zurich-New York route. The Newark flights concerned have also been rescheduled to improve connections to and from several other European markets via SWISS’s Zurich hub.

Flight LX 018 now leaves Zurich daily (instead of six times a week) at 17:30 and arrives in Newark at 20:20. Newark Airport is conveniently located for Southern Manhattan or destinations in New Jersey. The eastbound service departs from Newark at 22:00, enabling both business and leisure travellers to spend the whole day in New York before their air travel, and arrives in Zurich at 11:30 the following day.

Newark Airport also features a new departure gate with a more comfortable lounge for the use of SWISS First, HON Circle and SWISS Business customers prior to their departure. With its newly modified Newark service, SWISS now offers three daily non-stop flights between Zurich and New York: one to Newark and two to JFK.

SWISS is the only airline in Europe to provide a three-class product with an Economy, Business and First Class cabin on all its intercontinental flights. The advanced Business Class offers optimum sleeping comfort aloft: the two-metre-long bed is fully reclinable and also boasts an integrated massage function. As well as over 200 passengers, the SWISS Airbus A340-300 can carry some 18 tonnes of cargo per flight.

Swiss International Air Lines Ltd. Corporate Communications 29/03/2012

SWISS is to make upward adjustments to its current intercontinental air fares. The increases affect Economy and Business Class travel from Switzerland, and will come into effect on 2 April.

In view of the changed market environment, SWISS is compelled to make adjustments to fares on its intercontinental services. Economy Class fares will increase by between CHF 10 and CHF 30, while Business Class fares will be raised by between CHF 50 and CHF 100. First Class fares will remain unchanged. Certain types of fare – such as lower fare categories and special offers – will also be exempt from the increases planned.

The new revised fares will apply to tickets issued from 2 April onwards for travel from Switzerland on the routes concerned. All tickets issued up until such time will be subject to the current fare provisions.

Swiss International Air Lines Ltd. Corporate Communications 28/03/2012

Swiss International Air Lines is making some changes to its European services from Zurich, Geneva and Basel in its 2012 summer schedules, in response to shifts in demand. SWISS’s intercontinental network will see service increased to Beijing and Chicago. Frequencies will also be raised on the Zurich-Newark route, which will now be operated using SWISS’s own Airbus A340 equipment.

SWISS will serve a total of 70 destinations (47 European and 23 intercontinental) in 38 countries in its 2012 summer schedules. The services will be provided by a 90-aircraft fleet: 84 of SWISS’s own and a further six operating under wet-lease agreements. The summer schedules are valid from 25 March to 27 October 2012, and may be viewed in full on the swiss.com website.

Services from Zurich
On its European network from its Zurich hub, SWISS is increasing its services to Prague from three to four a day, while Bucharest receives a second daily flight. Genoa has also joined the SWISS Zurich network, served twice daily since 8 March with the flights operated by partner carrier Darwin Airline under a codeshare agreement. Elsewhere, SWISS is reducing its capacity slightly to certain regions such as the UK, Benelux and Germany, and will also be cancelling a small number of flights in the summer months.

On its Zurich-based intercontinental network, SWISS is raising its frequencies to Chicago to eleven flights a week. Service to Newark is also being expanded from six times weekly to daily; and the flights will now be operated using SWISS’s own Airbus A340 equipment seating 219 passengers from the start of the summer schedules. Frequencies to the recently-added destination of Beijing will also be increased to a daily service from the end of May. Services on the Zurich-Cairo route will be reduced to four times weekly for the summer months. Service to Cameroon will be withdrawn with the cutover to the summer schedules, for economic reasons.

Services from Geneva
SWISS will also be making individual adjustments to its European services from Geneva in its summer schedules. Nice will receive a third daily flight; and both the third daily service to Madrid and the second daily Athens flight introduced in February will also be retained. Services from Geneva underwent further expansion on 8 March: under a codeshare agreement with Darwin Airline, SWISS now offers direct flights from Geneva to Luxembourg, Genoa and Lugano. Further SWISS/Darwin Airline codeshare services to Florence and Venice will be added with the start of the summer schedules. Elsewhere, individual flights will be cancelled on selected routes (e.g. to the UK and Spain) in the summer months in response to lack of demand.

Services from Basel
SWISS will be adopting a revised range of services from EuroAirport Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg on 21 May. In addition to the existing destinations of Hamburg, Barcelona, Prague and Rome, London City will return to the Basel-based network, served twice a day using SWISS’s own equipment. Copenhagen, Budapest and Manchester will no longer be served directly from Basel, but will still be easily reachable via Zurich. Brussels remains in SWISS’s Basel network with two daily flights, though these will now be operated by partner carrier Brussels Airlines under a codeshare agreement.

Edelweiss Air and SWISS leisure flights
SWISS’s sister carrier Edelweiss Air will be offering a wide range of services to popular vacation destinations in the summer months. From Zurich Edelweiss Air will be adding Alicante and Madeira to its European programme, while the long-haul network will see the addition of Tampa (Florida) flights. Edelweiss Air will also be providing a twice-weekly summer service between Zurich and Tokyo which will supplement SWISS’s own services on the route.

SWISS, 22/03/2012

2011 financial results

SWISS reports total income from operating activities of CHF 4,927 million for 2011, a 3% increase on the previous year. With a slump in business and rising fuel costs in the fourth-quarter period, however, operating profit for the year declined a substantial 17% from the CHF 368 million of 2010 to CHF 306 million. The fourth-quarter operating profit of CHF 18 million was a full 87% down on the CHF 135 million recorded for October-to-December 2010.

Swiss International Air Lines (Group) generated total income from operating activities of CHF 4,927 million for 2011, a 3% increase on the CHF 4,774 million of the prior year. Operating profit declined 17%, however, to CHF 306 million. SWISS achieved an operating profit of CHF 18 million for the fourth-quarter period, compared to CHF 135 million for the last three months of 2010.

“Our operating results for 2011 clearly reflect the crisis in Japan and the upheavals in North Africa in the course of the year,” says CEO Harry Hohmeister. “But they are also the product of a far-from-easy market, especially in the fourth-quarter period. While our load factors remain high,” he continues, “the yield situation is giving us sizeable cause for concern. We see little prospect of any improvement here at present; and these difficulties are being exacerbated by very high oil prices and the strength of the Swiss franc.”

In response to these trends, SWISS has already initiated short-term actions to stabilize and improve its earnings for 2012. These include a hiring freeze for overhead functions and reappraisals and reductions of both representational expenses and the costs of external consultants. Parallel to this, SWISS is also involved in the broader long-term “SCORE Change for Success” structural results-enhancement programme of the Lufthansa Group. All in all, SWISS expects these endeavours to permanently improve its operating results by some CHF 100 million. “Given the changed parameters in which we are now operating, we must take substantial action now if we are to achieve a sustainable and recurrent improvement in our operating results,” underlines Marcel Klaus, SWISS Chief Financial Officer and SCORE Project Leader.

Fourth-quarter earnings down 87%
SWISS’s total income from operating activities for the fourth quarter of 2011 amounted to CHF 1,220 million – a 2% decline on the CHF 1,244 million of the prior-year period. Operating profit slumped 87%, from CHF 135 million to CHF 18 million. “We are facing two key challenges here,” explains CFO Marcel Klaus. “First, the strength of the Swiss franc is intensifying competition, as our rivals are working from a euro or a dollar cost base; and secondly, the rising fuel prices can only be offset to a limited extent by raising our own fuel surcharges.”

SWISS increased its fourth-quarter capacity by 3.2% (Europe up 7.3%, intercontinental up 1.2%) compared to the prior-year period. The 37,216 flights operated were 4.4% more than in the comparable period of 2010. Total passengers carried numbered 3.75 million, up 4.1% on the 3.61 million of October-to-December 2010. Systemwide seat load factor for the period amounted to 80.9%, down 1.3 percentage points. Seat load factor for European services slipped 0.6 percentage points to 72.5%, while seat load factor on intercontinental routes also fell slightly to 85.2% (down 1.4 percentage points). Fourth-quarter capacity at Swiss WorldCargo was raised 7%. Cargo load factor for the period amounted to 79.4%, down 3.5 percentage points.

Capacity and passenger growth in 2011
“As our results trends for 2011 all too clearly show, high passenger numbers and seat load factors are only part of the story in the airline business, and don’t always translate into strong earnings results,” explains CFO Marcel Klaus. “Earnings per ticket and other factors such as currency movements and fuel prices are just as important.”

SWISS transported more passengers in 2011 than any airline had done previously in the history of Swiss aviation. The 15,317,275 passengers carried were an 8.1% increase on the 14,168,718 of 2010. Total capacity in available seat-kilometres (ASK) was up 7.7%, while total traffic volume in revenue passenger-kilometres (RPK) was a 7.1% improvement on the prior year. Systemwide seat load factor amounted to 81.8%, slightly below the 2010 record of 82.3%. All in all, SWISS operated 150,131 flights in 2011, a 6.2% increase on the 141,405 flights of the previous year.

On its intercontinental routes, SWISS raised its ASK capacity by 6.8%. RPK traffic volumes increased by 5.5%. Seat load factor slipped accordingly to 85.7%, a decline of 1.1 percentage points. For its European network SWISS increased its ASK production by 9.4%. RPK traffic volume for the year was 10.6% up on 2010; and seat load factor showed a corresponding improvement, rising 0.8 percentage points to 74.3%.
On the airfreight front, Swiss WorldCargo raised its total cargo tonne-kilometres for the year by 3%. Cargo load factor stood at 78.5%, a 2.6-percentage-point decline on 2010.

Fleet expansion and new destinations
SWISS continues to pursue its planned fleet expansion. Two further Airbus A330-300s – the eleventh and twelfth – joined the fleet in January and February 2012, and a thirteenth will follow in October. Two more new Airbus A320s will be delivered this spring. February saw the inauguration of SWISS’s 25th intercontinental destination, Beijing. Service on the new Zurich-Beijing route will be increased to daily from the end of May. Elsewhere, a new Geneva-Nice service was established, and further frequencies were added on the existing routes between Geneva and London, Moscow and Madrid. This May SWISS will be revising its schedules from and to EuroAirport Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg. Direct service will be reintroduced between Basel and London City; the Basel-Brussels route will switch to a codeshare operation with SWISS partner carrier Brussels Airlines; and the existing Basel services to Budapest, Copenhagen and Manchester will be withdrawn, along with certain frequencies on further routes.

Further increases planned in operational personnel numbers
A total of 7,644 persons were employed at SWISS at the end of 2011 (2010: 7,506), or 6,326 in full-time-equivalent terms (2010: 6,140 FTEs). SWISS thus created around 200 new full-time positions in the course of 2011. The company will continue to make securing existing jobs and further expanding its workforce one of its prime priorities. The fleet expansion planned for 2012 should create some 300 new jobs in the cockpit and cabin alone. SWISS is also establishing its own line maintenance operation, which will add some 200 further jobs to the company workforce.

A strengthened positioning and a sharper brand profile
SWISS sharpened its brand profile in autumn 2011 to strengthen its positioning as “The Airline of Switzerland” and its strong focus on closeness to the customer and on product and service quality. Following completion of the corresponding programme in September 2011, the entire SWISS long-haul fleet is now equipped with the advanced new Business Class cabin. SWISS is the only carrier in Europe to offer a three-class product on all its intercontinental flights.

Outlook
Yields remain under pressure, and the market is still saddled with excess capacity. SWISS has already responded to these adversities, by making specific adjustments to frequencies and routes in line with changed and changing demand. “We are monitoring developments very closely, and will act swiftly to realign our capacities to the market situation as and when required,” confirms CEO Harry Hohmeister. “We have taken a number of actions to enhance our earnings already, and more will follow. Given the present pressure on margins, we will also need to reappraise our current pricing structures and consider fare increases, too.”

SWISS press release, Zurich Airport, 15 March 2012