Budget airline Wizz Air to add 300 aircraft to fleet

Wizz Air is based in Hungary and currently has a fleet of just over 200 aircraft. 

Budget airline and Ryanair rival Wizz Air has announced plans to add more than 300 new airplanes in the coming years and have 20,000 employees by 2030.

If successful, the Hungary-based airline would more than double the size of its fleet, and the number of its employees from the 9,000 it currently has. The company currently has 208 aircraft.

Chief executive of Wizz Air Jozsef Varadi told Hungarian news website index.hu the company’s goal is to have a fleet of 500 aircraft by 2030-2032.

"The expansion of the aircraft fleet... will create opportunities for new base airports and even establishing new airline companies,” he said.

Mr Varadi said geopolitical tensions such as the war in Ukraine and conflict between Israel and Hamas, had forced the company to re-allocate unused capacity in those regions, leading to suboptimal capacity exploitation.

An ongoing engine recall is also keeping a fifth of the company's fleet grounded.

"These events will affect our performance in the short term," he said.

The budget airline has said that full-year earnings for the year to March 31 are in line with revised guidance of between €350m and €370m, having previously guided in a range of €250m to €400m.

Reuters