After a tough battle with the COVID pandemic, with no government support, AirAsia X has emerged, restructured, revitalized and ready to expand.
That restructuring has made the airline group leaner and better able to meet any challenges ahead suggests its Perth-educated and passionate aviation enthusiast CEO, Benyamin Ismail.
However, the relaunch of AirAsia X has been gradual by design as most of the airline’s aircraft were grounded and required maintenance before carrying passengers.
Mr Ismail told AirlineRatings.com that the “whole world couldn’t get enough maintenance slots for the required overhauls after being grounded” and that slowed up the relaunch of passenger services.
The airline now has 18 Airbus A330s in its system but four are still going through maintenance.
“Our strategy out of COVID was to get at least get one foot in all the markets that we used to fly.”
“So, in Australia, we’re flying into Melbourne, Sydney, and Gold Coast, as well as Perth,” Mr Ismail said.
The airline has returned to Korea, Japan and India but China is not yet back to pre-COVID flight levels.
“We’re making sure that we have enough capacity when China does open up fully.”
Mr Ismail said that Australia is a significant market for the airline.
“It is a core market for us. We haven’t gone to the frequency that we want yet. Sydney, we’re flying up to 11 weekly flights.
“Perth is daily. So, we’re not there yet. Ideally, we want Perth to be double daily as there is pent-up demand for travel out of Australia.
“Potentially I think we do want to grow this market, and we may look at addressing some of the other markets that were untapped for us before in the past.
“So maybe Adelaide,” Mr Ismail said.
Further afield Mr Ismail says the airline will look again at the US and the UK when it receives a fleet of more capable Airbus A330-900neos.
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In the near term, the airline is looking at Central Asia.
“Places like Turkey, Kazakhstan or Uzbek or even Africa and there are other markets as well. Africa is very underserved in terms of carriers out of this side of the world.
“So that is something that we’re working on now.
“We haven’t been shy on saying that we want to go to Istanbul, we want to go to Kazakhstan, we want to go to Africa.”
These destinations are on the airline’s 18-month radar.
However, Europe is potentially around 2026 when the first 15 A330-900neos, with greater range and capacity, arrive.
Mr Ismal said that Thai AirAsia X may start a Bangkok-Perth service particularly as Thai International has not returned to Perth.
“I think Bangkok-Perth will be a good market.”
Mr. Ismail said that growth is everywhere.
“People are coming out of Japan, people coming out of Korea. And of course, Australia is a great example.
“I was just in Sydney two weeks ago and I was talking to the media and they were saying that it seems that now travel has become part of your disposable income, they don’t mind eating less every day just to travel more.
“And that’s something that is happening now in Australia. We’ve seen that in our flights and the booking during peak season is crazy,” Mr Ismail said.
Mr Ismail said one of the strengths of AirAsia X is its network.
“We connect to the AirAsia Group of airlines and to over 150 destinations in Asia from our hub in Kuala Lumpur.
“We are working hard to entice people in Australia that there is life after Bali. We have Thailand, we have Vietnam, India, Japan, and Korea.”
