REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA – Garuda Indonesia plans to seek for 450 million USD external financing to buy new planes. “Garuda needs a total of 1.5 billion USD to buy new planes,” the Director of Garuda, Emirsyah Satar, said on Tuesday in Jakarta.
Satar said the company was seeking financial advisor for the plan. The external financing source could be from the releasing of global bonds. Yet, this matter needs to be discussed further.
Satar also said the company could conduct its expansion plan by acquisition on the next three or five years. Several options are still open on the table. The targets of acquisition can be local or international airlines as the company tries to develop domestic and international flight routes.
Garuda is also developing connecting flight with China’s Sky Team to connect the flight between Indonesia and some countries where Sky Team flies. The company also tries to cooperate with EVA Airlines, Korea Airlines, Chech Airlines, and Aero Airlines. The flight connection potentially increases the company sales up to 10 percent.
The Analyst from E-Trading Securities Grady Wijaya said the growth of Garuda domestic flight market was very strong. Its traffic in domestic flight grows 37.9 percent, from 8.7 million passengers on 2010 to 12 million passengers on 2011, while the international flight also increases from 2.4 million to 3.1 million. “The increasing reaches 29.2 percent,” Wijaya said.