New aircraft and routes for Montenegro

Sweet 16
Montenegro Airlines announced yesterday that its fourth Embraer E195 jet will arrive soon and will be welcomed into the existing fleet of 5 Fokker F100s and 3 E195s. Zoran Djurišić, the airline’s CEO, made the announcement at the airline’s 16th birthday party in Podgorica. The new aircraft will be accompanied by the launch of two new routes from Podgorica. The airline will inaugurate flights to Milan in Italy and the European capital, Brussels. Neither the launch date of the new flights nor the arrival date of the new aircraft has been specified, although they are not expected until next year.

As the airline turns 16, Djurišić noted that it had carried 4.5 million passengers so far. Montenegro Airlines was registered on October 24, 1994. The airline’s founder and CEO, Zoran Djurišić, presented the airline’s plans to the Government of Montenegro and Yugoslavia in 1993. However, it wouldn’t be until 1996 that the airline’s first aircraft would be purchased. Due to political and economic circumstances at the time, Montenegro Airlines took off to the sky on May 7, 1997 on route from Podgorica to Bari in Italy. The aircraft in question was a Fokker 28Mk 4000 and the second aircraft of this type was received the following year in 1998. In late 1999, Montenegro Airlines launched new flights, most notably to Frankfurt. The first Fokker F100, the airline’s signature aircraft, was purchased in 2000. In 2007, the airline purchased new Embraer jets in another wave of fleet modernisation. Earlier this month, the Montenegrin Government put 30% of the airline’s shares up for sale.

Comments

  1. Arturo09:31

    Montenegro Airlines is a gem. No alliance affliation like OU. No affulent government support like JU. No geographical advantage like JP. Yet they still manage to do a great job. Look at what they offer, I'd fly them then taking a bus at any time of the day.

    Skopje-Podgorica-Frankfurt
    EUR222 (return)
    3h35m with connection

    Nis-Podgorica-Zurich
    EUR199 (return)
    4h30m with connection

    Daily operation. No random seasonal scheduling. A humble fleet, but efficient. A small network, but serves both directions well. Montenegro deserves some recognition from us!

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  2. frequentflyer11:45

    Arturo, you've hit on something important here: they keep a consistent schedule which makes it easy for business travelers (who ultimately keep airlines going) as well as leisure travelers. I don't think there are many other carriers in the exYU which can claim the same (though OU does have certain major routes which operate consistently all year at identical schedules).

    4.5m doesn't seem many pax though for 16 years of service...

    Incidentally, 3 100-seat 190s have just come on the market courtesy of F7, these would make an excellent addition to YMs fleet due to commonality.

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  3. Anonymous12:07

    The only airline in the region which knows what they are doing.

    Love their product and love how their doing business.

    Wish them many years in the air.

    9 aircraft for a population of ~ 650,000. Equates to about 1 aircraft to 72,000 people. One of the best ratios out there.

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  4. ANONYMOUS15:09

    "Gem"?!? Hahahaha

    "No affulent government support like JU" - Hahahaha

    Why do you think the government is SO desperate to get YM off of its books? It is losing so much money, it's untrue. As a % of revenue, YM loses around 25-30% per year. Shocking.

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  5. Anonymous15:33

    Arturo, I don’t think there is a single airline in EX-YU that gets so much support from their govt.as YM.

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  6. Happy birthday Montenegro!!

    I agree with all of you Arturo and Anonymus about the ratio of aircraft to population.
    Great job for YM!
    I am so happy having a reasonably priced and descent airline like YM flying to Macedonia.
    The only airline in the ex-yu that is trying to manage the situation instead of waiting the situation to manage you.

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  7. SerbianSausage20:30

    First of all congratulations to Montenegro Airlines, Montenegro, and the Montenegrin people. Second, Montenegro Airlines is one of the most poorly-run airlines in the Balkans. It is losing so much money and was on the road to bankruptcy if JAT hadn't stepped in foolishly and decided to merge the two fleets. Thirdly, I don't see any point in MA buying more aircraft when it can barely fill up the Fockers it has. Very bad decision making, but nonetheless, a good choice to privatize the airline.

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  8. Arturo02:12

    Dobro ;) I didn't mean to be harsh. Montenegro doesn't have the largest diaspora population abroad, nor are commercial activities as vibrant as in Serbia. From a customer perspective, YM is indeed reliable, efficient and reliable. (I remember someone here who failed to book a connection on B&H via Sarajevo?)

    The most epic thing, however, is the Minister of Tourism. This blog once reported his intention to turn Montenegro into a vacation paradise for "the rich and the famous". As if he doesn't know people flock to Miami and Rio for beaches, Ibiza and Berlin for parties, Nairobi for wildlife and Tokyo for electronic toys!

    Uhlala, whatever. Happy Birthday YM. Hope you can go from strenth to strength.

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  9. SerbianSausage08:00

    Let me tell you something Arturo...Belgrade is where the party is at ;)

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  10. Anonymous08:51

    @SerbianSausage

    What evidence do you have of Montenegro constantly being in deficit? What are their load factors? Why are they poorly run?

    Your response would be welcomed.

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  11. Anonymous09:18

    What evidence do you have of Montenegro constantly being in deficit?

    I might be mistaken but I have never seen YM publish openly their result the way JU, OU and JP do. Airlines love to brag how they are making money, since YM is not doing that it means something gotta be wrong out here ;)

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  12. Arturo10:43

    @The Sausage,

    Not until you waive the visa requirement for my passport ;) I promised to visit my friend in Novi Beograd 3 yrs ago and have yet done it!

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  13. Anonymous15:07

    Last anonymus, so if they don't publish thei results they're in deficit? Even though they're opening new routes and buying new aircraft into the fleet? Dude, Jat is publishing its results and shows that they're in a deficit. Therefore they're not adding any new aircraft or significant new routes. Montenegro Airlines is doing the opposit.

    So think again who's losing more money here.

    Congratz to Montenegro A.

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  14. SerbianSausage17:49

    @Arturo

    Where are you from? Anyway, it better be on your list of things to do lol.

    @The Anonymi

    MA is in deficit because they were complaining about losing money on routes to Belgrade WHICH IS THEIR MOST PROFITABLE ROUTE. They are getting beaten on other routes, and I read in a Russian paper some time ago that Russian airlines are constantly beating MA on flights to Tivat. So yes, MA is losing money...lots of money, or they wouldn't beg JAT for a merger. Sorry to dampen your pride, but that's the fact. And if it were making money, it would publish that because which airline wouldn't do that unless their CEOs were retarded or just too fucking stupid to even be alive.
    MA's load factors are on average less than 73%. Which is not bad, but not good. And they are poorly run because they have incompetent people running the airline as if the object was to go bankrupt.

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  15. Montenegro is the best!!!
    Traralalalalalatralalala..
    Dude, Sausage please start commenting:-)

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  16. Anonymous00:51

    This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  17. SerbianSausage02:52

    This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  18. Anonymous09:10

    This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  19. wow. this whole discussion has been transformed into an expert level. congrats guys, plenty of useful information here, in particular from sausage;) I wonder why people perceive you as malicious

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  20. 73% load factor is very good, especial if you have daily flights to/from Nis, Skopje, Pristina, with load factor below 50%.

    True! MA not published there money reports, even they offer MA shares to the market.

    MA expect in 2010 about 700 000 passengers, and about 6 mil. euros loss.
    Approx. 65 000 pass. montley is limit for positive MA business and MA can`t reach that number in this moment.

    May be next year...

    BTW.
    2 MA F100 will be grounded in the end of 2012, and three more in the and of 2015.
    In this moment nobody knows how much E-195 (116 seats) MA will have in 2015.

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  21. SerbianSausage22:07

    @IN007

    This is not a nationalist convention...this is EX-YU AVIATION. If you can't say something important or worth MY time let alone anyone else's just stop coming here!

    @MN

    Thank you for being so sane lol. But I do sometimes have ideas which are controversial which can somehow upset people, and sometimes idiots perceive it as like some propaganda or something...but those are idiots ;)

    @Pera Kontras

    Are you sure 700,000 passengers? That's more than the Montenegrin population lol ;p

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  22. Hmmm dont be silly Sausage, you dont have such a big imapct to upset somebody.
    Instead your comments and "deep analysis" in the fields of agriculure to nano tecnology are merely as a joke so the more I read the more I laugh:-)
    You are a great expert!

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  23. SerbianSausage01:53

    @IN007

    In that case, I humbly and sincerely apologize to my extremely well-educated friend from Montenegro ;)

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  24. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  25. @SerbianSausage

    Last year 528 000 passengers with 7 a/c.
    This year about 700 000 with 8 a/c
    (more than 200 000 in july and august only)

    BTW.
    Only 15-20% of Montenegrian population have a passport.

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  26. SerbianSausage06:14

    @Pera Kontras

    They exceed my expectations :)

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