Tony Fernandes bought the wreckage of Tune Air of Malaysia (for US$0.25 or 50p) in December 2001 and renamed it AirAsia.
As a low-cost airline, it now has
• 72 aircraft,
• carried 55 million passengers,
• 61 domestic and international destinations with 108 routes
• 400 daily flights in the region (4 hours flying time or less)
• been profitable since 2002 and still is.
It also has a long haul carrier arm which started in 2007 – AirAsia X has London, Abu Dhabi, 3 Australian cities as destinations. Paris will be next.
With this undeniable success, who is this Tony Fernandes?
Whilst he was boarding at Epsom College in Surrey (UK), he developed a passion to own an airline and loved F1 motor sport. He then worked as an executive in Virgin Music and learnt from Richard Branson the benefits of working with the media. Tony, following his passion, started AirAsia at the nadir of after the 11th Sept 2001 (destruction of the Twin Towers in New York).
He has since developed alliances with partners in Thailand and Indonesia to extend the AirAsia airline brand. Also, he has started Tune Hotels – excellent low cost hotels with pricing based on Yield Management and Tune Money (Financial Services, modelled after Virgin Money). The Economist Interview with Tony Fernandes
How does Tony do it?
He faced tough competition from the “government owned” flag carriers of Malaysia and Singapore.
• He followed the business model of Ryanair (and easyjet) but with service levels comparable or exceeding legacy airlines in Europe and North America.
• His mantra “Dream the impossible, Believe the Unbelievable, Never Take No for an Answer”.
• He allows staff to work on their passions. People work best when allowed to work their passions – they go the extra mile.
• He is media savvy and is so aware of the changes in the world. AirAsia has one of the easiest to use web sites
in the industry and now they have just launched Koolred the AirAsia social networking site.
In keeping with the trend, he has a personal blog at http://www.tonyfernandesblog.com
and a twitter account
• Most importantly, his businesses give superb value to his customers, all with a very big cheerful smile.
What is next for Tony Fernandes?
He is team principle of Lotus F1 team in Formula 1 motor racing probably the world’s most competitive sporting event. We will be able to see his work laid open in the summer of 2010.
However, think of the branding advantage he is getting with this exposure.
Good Luck Tony, we will be rooting for you.
Dr Michael Oon
How Air Asia founder Tony Fernandes’ dream came true
