Maersk Air Cargo ditched some of its less-profitable customers, a move which saw its airfreight volumes fall 19% year on year, it said today when announcing its Q1 results.
“We took targeted actions to replace those businesses to focus on margin in favour of revenue,” said CEO Vincent Clerc this morning.
“EBIT margin remains the priority, even if this has to come at the expense of some revenue growth for a while, as we saw with the rebasing of middle-mile and air,” he added.
Volumes fell from 85,000 tonnes in Q1 24 to 69,000 in Q1 25, despite most other airlines saying they had a surprisingly good first quarter.
Airfreight forwarding was better, it said.
“Global air freight forwarding demand remained robust in Q1, although momentum slowed from the 7% growth in 2024. Capacity, by measure of available tonne-km, increased 4% year on year in Q1, supported by a pick-up in deliveries. And rates firmed, averaging $2.1 per kg, 10% more than in Q1 of 2024.”
Maersk – as with the other ‘flying’ shipping lines – bunches its airfreight financial results with ‘other services’, making it impossible to analyse its airline’s wins or losses.
Meanwhile, Emirates SkyCargo today released its full-year results – and evidently did not ditch customers.
Volume growth was up 7%, to 2.3m tonnes, following the arrival of two 777Fs and two wet-leased 747Fs into the fleet.
It said revenue from cargo was “solid”, at AEF16.1bn ($4.4bn), accounting for 13% of the airline’s total revenue. Yields per FTKM went up by 10%, no doubt boosted by falling jet fuel prices over the past year.
Its revenues compare well against Cargolux, which although having nearly double the freighter fleet, made $3.3bn in revenue in the 2024 financial year.
But Emirates noted successes in the past year, including the launch of ecommerce product Emirates Delivers in Saudi Arabia, which connects buyers there with sellers in the US and UK. It also launched eQuote, a digital self-service for customers to manage requests and spot quotations.
The Dubai carrier has placed orders for 10 more 777Fs, which would double its 777F fleet, and has 13 freighters on order in total, expected to be delivered by the end of 2026.
