UPDATE 1-Mexico's Volaris signs $4.9 bln engine deal with Pratt & Whitney
(Updates with details)
MEXICO CITY, Feb 11 (Reuters) - Pratt & Whitney's agreementwith Volaris to provide the Mexican airline with engines andtheir maintenance for 80 new Airbus A320neo aircraft is wortharound $4.9 billion, Volaris Chief Executive Officer EnriqueBeltranena said on Thursday.
After factoring in the time the company had the aircraft,the deal with Pratt & Whitney, a division of RaytheonTechnologies Corp, would run through until at least 2040,Beltranena said in an interview with Reuters.
"Together with this maintenance agreement, it's somewherearound 4.9 billion dollars," Beltranena said.
Volaris will take delivery of the A320neo planes from2023-2027, a purchase it first announced in late 2017, he noted.
Low cost airline Volaris has fared better than Mexicancompetitors during the coronavirus pandemic, expanding itsmarket share inside Latin America's second-biggest economy.
Beltranena said that restrictions on activity due to thepandemic had made for a "much more complicated" start to 2021than the company had anticipated. But he was upbeat about theprospects for business during the Easter holidays.
The carrier reported January passenger traffic was at 97%capacity of the same month in 2020, and Beltranena said thatfigure could dip in February to "80-something" percent.
Bookings for Mexico's Semana Santa, or Holy Week, during theturn of March-April looked "very strong" and reservations forthe summer were also healthy, the CEO said.
The airline should be profitable in June and during thethird quarter as a whole, Beltranena said.
Speaking alongside the Volaris CEO, Rick Deurloo, ChiefCommercial Officer of Pratt & Whitney, said the company expecteddemand for narrow body aircraft like the A320 to recover topre-pandemic levels "in the 2023 timeframe."
"We do see a lot of pent-up demand," he said.(Reporting by Dave Graham; editing by Frank Jack Daniel)
