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AirAsia renames holding company as it gears up for ‘v-shaped’ recovery
October 15th 2021
AirAsia’s holding company has changed its name to AirAsia Aviation Ltd as it gears up for a V-shaped recovery and looks at new markets such as Cambodia. Read More » The company said the change form AirAsia Investment Ltd would make a clear distinction between its digital and airline arms. It will see former AirAsia Group (Airlines) president, Bo Lingam, take over as group chief executive of AirAsia Aviation, overseeing AirAsia Malaysia, AirAsia Philippines, AirAsia Thailand and AirAsia Indonesia. AirAsia Group Berhad is the investment holding company for the eight digital groups. Its wide-ranging portfolio covers AirAsia Aviation, the airasia Super App, cargo and logistics venture Teleport, BigPay financial services, the edutech arm AirAsia Academy, engineering company Asia Digital Engineering, ground services division GTR as well as restaurant and food group Santan. “This structural change helps facilitate strong projected growth in both airline and non-airline portfolio businesses, “ Lingam said. “The AirAsia Aviation Limited entity holds our existing airline investments and paves the way for new airline ventures to be formed in due course. We also have established a AirAsia Consulting division tasked at reviewing new airline partnerships and franchise opportunities.” Lingam said management had spent the last 18 months reviewing every aspect of the operation to make sure its airlines returned stronger [post the pandemic]. The world was finally opening, he said, and AirAsia foresaw a V-shaped rebound in air travel in the near future with Malaysia already showing pent-up demand. “We are operating more than 60 daily flights to 16 key leisure destinations and more frequencies and routes will be added in response to significant consumer demand,” he said. “Pleasing progress is underway in our other airlines in Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines as services are resuming in line with accelerated vaccination rates and the easing of travel restrictions in our key markets. We look forward to the opening of international borders as the next key milestone. We will continue to review new markets in which to operate in the future, for example Cambodia, when we can connect ASEAN once again with the best value fares and lifestyle offerings.” The announcement followed Credit Suisse’s US$ 1 billion valuation of AirAsia’s digital arm earlier this week propelled it into tech unicorn territory with fellow Malaysian companies Carsome and edotco.
