Business travellers returning to air bright spot for loss-making Air New Zealand
Thursday, 26 February 2026
Business and government travellers flying more after a year of reduced demand is one bright spot in a grim set of results for Air New Zealand.
“We're starting to see, over the last few weeks, corporate travel is particular pick up,” the airline’s chief executive Nikhil Ravishankar said in an interview after releasing his first set of financial results at the helm of the national carrier.
Air New Zealand reported a pre-tax loss of $59 million for the first half of the 2026 financial year, down from a $40m profit a year ago and signalled trading conditions would not improve over the rest of the year.
After tax, the national carrier’s loss was $40 million for the first six months of the year, compared to an $98m profit in the prior comparative period.
The loss was greater than the airline had forecast when it said in October its pre-tax losses would be between $30m to $55m mainly because of a $13m hit from higher-than-expected fuel prices in the second quarter.
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Ongoing fleet constraints, a slow recovery in domestic demand and other rising costs exacerbated by a weaker New Zealand dollar also contributed to the loss.
Up to eight aircraft were grounded at times due to the ongoing global engine maintenance delays, which meant capacity across the network was broadly flat.
But Rolls Royce’s latest round of fixes for the 787 engines had been successful and those would be applied to Air New Zealand aircraft allowing two of its grounded 787 to service over the course of this calender year, Ravishankar said.
“And on the Pratt and Whitney side, we've reached a negotiated outcome where we will be down to no more than three A320neo aircraft on ground. We've currently got four grounded aircraft by the first of April this year, and down to two grounded aircraft by the first of November this year. So what that means is we'll have half of our currently grounded fleet flying between now and December 26.”
The airline would also take delivery of two of 10 new 787 aircraft in May and June, providing widebody capacity growth of about 20% to 25% over the next two years.
But modest capacity increases in the second half of the financial year as more aircraft became available were unlikely to translate immediately into higher earnings, Ravishankar said.
An exasperated ACT leader and deputy prime minister David Seymour is criticising the airline for failing to do its job.
Seymour wants to see the Government-owned enterprise sold off, saying it had become distracted by “a million other objectives”.
“Get woke, go broke. We hear about electric planes, glossy reports on climate change, paper cups in the Koru Lounge. What they can't seem to do is take off and land on time.”
Because of the airline’s woes, the board ordered a full strategy review when Ravishankar took over the top job in October.
“We're looking at all aspects of the business, both on the revenue side, the cost side, as well as the capital management side. And even as early as next week, we'll …test it with a large part of our workforce, about 4000 of our colleagues.”
He said the airline was a few months away from finalising the review that he hoped would return the airline to sustained profitability.