NATS has reported a turnover of £899 million for the year, and a pre-tax profit of £191 million.

Richard Deakin, chief executive, NATS said: “This has been another solid financial performance for NATS.

“At the same time, we delivered exceptional service performance.

“The Olympics was one of the greatest operational challenges the company has ever faced but I am proud to say, along with the rest of Britain, we delivered.”

NATS safely handled 2.1 million flights during the year with even better punctuality than the previous year and a seamless service for the London Olympics.

Average delay per flight was 1.4 seconds compared with 7.3 seconds the previous year, reflecting the benefit of new controller tools and systems.

This is about four per cent of the equivalent European average and NATS’ best-ever performance.

In total, 99.9 per cent of flights over the UK incurred no NATS-attributable delay.

NATS also joined the prime minister David Cameron on a UK trade mission to Brazil as part of the Olympics handover and legacy, to share its expertise developed over a three-year planning period for London 2012.

“By providing our customers with more efficient flight profiles, in 2013 we enabled further savings of 6,926 tonnes of fuel worth approximately £4.5 million.

“Cumulatively, since our programme started in 2008, we have enabled fuel savings of 250,000 tonnes, saving customers £160 million.

“We are also meeting the economic regulator’s target for environmental efficiency,” added Deakin.