All-business airline Silverjet has announced an airfare sale to celebrate carrying its 100,000th passenger. Anyone booking before 31 May for travel from Luton to either New York Newark or Dubai until 6 September will pay £999 including tax.

Lawrence Hunt, Silverjet’s chief executive, said: “Every one of the hundred thousand customers who’ve flown with us has played a part in Silverjet’s success story. As the world’s most civilised airline, we wanted to celebrate this success with a sale that delivers real benefits to our business customers and is as seamless and stress free as Silverjet itself.”

The airline recently secured additional investment of £12.6 million from Viceroy, a luxury brand development fund, in the form of a £8.4 million loan and a proposed £4.2 million issue of new shares. The issues of shares is subject to existing shareholder approval and an EGM has been called for 30 May. Viceroy also intends to invest up to a further £38 million in the airline in the future.

The airline said in a circular to shareholders that the extra funding was necessary as passenger statistics had not been as high as hoped. “In light of the airline sector becoming increasingly challenging, a rival all business class airline filing for bankruptcy and negative research being published on Silverjet, a number of travel agents and customers have temporarily suspended booking with Silverjet.”

However, the airline says that forward bookings are “particularly strong”.