Tony Fernandes CEO Blog

I received this letter late last week and I thought I’d share it with you. This just goes to show that we’ve come a long way since we first met because when we first met in 2007 it wasn’t in the best of terms and now just a couple of years down, here we are working together to better educate ourselves on the needs of everyone who would fly.

It is amazing and blows me away to have these disabled friends of ours, understanding where we are as a LCC and their unrelenting commitment to make the LCC work for disabled guests and everyone in general, with what we have and mind you which is with limited resources and the airport layout. That itself is humbling indeed and from the bottom of our hearts we thank you BEAT!

Barrier-free Environment and Accessible Transport (BEAT),
c/o No 4, Lorong 1A/71 J,
Jalan Carey, 46000 Petaling Jaya.

15 November 2011

AirAsia Berhad,
LCC Terminal, Jalan KLIA S3,
Southern Support, Zone KLIA,
64000 Sepang, Selangor Darul Ehsan.

Attention : Tan Sri Tony Fernandes, Group CEO AirAsia Berhad,
Mr. Bo Lingam, Head of Operations and Planning, AirAsia Berhad.

Dear Tan Sri Tony and Bo,

We, at BEAT, feel very honoured to be given the opportunity to be involved and to support AirAsia in providing training for your staff. Thank you, AirAsia for giving BEAT the full trust and confidence to develop the cross disability training syllabus and modules and to conduct the training.

We are also thankful to be given the opportunity by AirAsia to introduce Disability Equality Training (“DET”) on top of the Disability Related Service Training (“DRST”). DET gives us a correct understanding of disability issues from the perspective of equality and justice. With DET, DRST will be properly understood, better appreciated and more effective.

BEAT wants to give maximum credit to Tan Sri Tony Fernandes, group CEO of AirAsia, for it was Tan Sri Tony who recognised that the training would be best conducted by and with the involvement of disabled people themselves - the end users of the service. It was Tan Sri Tony who invited BEAT to be involved in the training.

As a gesture of his commitment, Tan Sri presented BEAT the AirAsia cap he was wearing on when he met us on 20th July,2007, with his hand written wordings “To all my BEAT friends”, “You have my 100% commitment", and “Dare to dream”. These words which came directly from Tan Sri himself had given us great motivation to give all our best to support AirAsia in the effort to further improve the service to include disabled passengers. Knowingly or unknowingly, Tan Sri Tony has helped put into practice our very famous slogan “Nothing about us without us”. Thank you, again, Tan Sri !
As part of our mission is to work towards a better and accessible environment and an inclusive society including improved services, we see it as part of our responsibility to offer and share our knowledge, experience and expertise because we know best our own needs and how we want to be served. BEAT is fully committed and proud to be working in partnership with AirAsia in implementing change for better and improved service. We know that the good service will ultimately benefit us and the community at large.

May we also take this opportunity to put on record our special thanks and deepest appreciation to Mr. Bo Lingam, Head of Operations and Planning, who was entrusted by Tan Sri, to work with us for the past 3 ½ years. To mention a few, we found Bo to be friendly, easy going, trusting, understanding, accepting, accommodating, fair, reasonable, open minded, and fun to work with and to be with. In short, we have “fallen in love” with him  More importantly, Bo has been able to work with us not just as a working partner but as a friend.

Over the few years of working together, Bo has been able to better understand our struggle and appreciate us for who we are. On most occasions, Bo would make his time available even after office hours to accommodate our timing as many of us work during day time. He would let us decide on the venue of meeting most accessible to us. At times, when we had more issues to work at, the meetings would be dragged till late nights and Bo would stay put throughout every meeting session. There were also occasions when Bo sacrificed his Saturday mornings to meet us. Thank you, Bo for your full support and commitment!

Through Bo and his team, we have got many changes implemented. Among them - the terms and conditions which were discriminatory and unfair towards disabled passengers have been removed. Disabled people who travel unaccompanied are now able to travel on AirAsia. Online bookings are now made possible. Disabled passengers are no more required to sign Indemnity Forms. RM 12 is no more charged for usage of each wheelchair. Special assistance is given upon request without charge. Aisle chair made available when a disabled passenger is on board. Passenger boarding lift made available at LCCT upon request. Special Assistance Service Counter established at LCCT. Developed DET&DRST cross disability training syllabus and modules and mainstreaming them as part of the overall syllabus conducted at AirAsia Academy. Syabas, Bo and Team!

In the face of alternative training offers by local and international groups, Bo recognized the effort, commitment and past record of BEAT and stood by us. Bo maintained that BEAT would continue with the training in Malaysia and also help to extend the training to Thailand and Indonesia. Hence, Bo was in fact instrumental in realising the recently concluded DET&DRST Training of Trainers involving participants from Thailand and Indonesia. Thank you, Bo!

Now that Bo has “left us” for greater tasks else where in AirAsia, we sincerely wish him the best in all his undertakings. We assure you, Bo, that we will give our full support to Zaman and team as we continue the good work you have laid down.

To Bo, we thank you for all that you have been to us. Please do drop by and visit us as and when your time permits. We know that we are not only going to miss you but we will miss you a whole lot!

Warm regards,
Christine & Team,
B.E.A.T. Malaysia.

Recently, there has been a lot of talk about unions. AirAsia has 9,000 staff and no unions. Why? Because we look after our staff. You only need unions if management doesn’t take care of the staff.

AirAsia staff are paid well, they get an annual bonus and are provided with opportunities for career advancement. The company does well, and so do they.

I’m not sure what some unions do. Are unions democratic, do they represent all the staff? Some union leaders have been in office for years. Are they benefitting themselves or the staff?

Yes, worker’s rights are important but I still feel dialogue is the best way forward. We should all win together.

What a dream come true. Was a poor result on Sunday but that does not deter me . I love it.

When you lose a class player like Traore and then his back up Connoley, it’s going to hurt. Then you bring Orr out and move Luke Young to the left side. And at warm up,Yiu – the third choice centre back pulls a hamstring. Total disruption.

Anyway we get Gabiddon, and Traore back for Blackburn. Let’s see.

Think we have a good squad, though it needs to be strengthened in the January transfer window. But this is a long road; we should be attacking more at home, maybe play with two strikers. it’s good to have Mackie back.

But I’m thrilled. This year is about avoiding relegation, sorting out our future home, building a good squad, build new training facilities and a new academy and growing new commercial opportunities.

I’m loving it! Going to be some tough weeks ahead but I love it when my back is against the wall. See you at Loftus Road Oct. 15.

I have been travelling quite a fair bit lately and once in a while I receive letters like this and it really makes it worth while.

Thank you Andrew Ciseau of Brisbane, Australia. I’d also like to hear from you out there and help us make it better for you.

Good afternoon Tony,

My name is Andrew Ciseau from Brisbane, Australia, and I am writing to you to provide some feedback on my recent trip on AirAsia and AirAsia X.

It has been just over 3 years since I last travelled multiple legs on AirAsia, and I must say I am impressed with how things have changed.

The biggest thing I think you have achieved is consistency of product and service. My flights from Gold Coast, KL, Langkawi, Penang, Singapore and back home again were all of a high standard of customer service, as well as travel experience. Everything from the plane décor and food were consistent, which for a traveller is very comforting when visiting new places. This is in stark contrast to my last AirAsia experience which started with the old IT system which was anything but user friendly, and didn’t get much better after that. However it is good to see just how your product can shine once you have all of the ‘backbone’ infrastructure in place and settled down.

One thing I would suggest is that you start marketing yourself in Australia as a Low Cost, but high quality service airline. The LCC offerings in Australia, have had customer service levels driven to the lowest common denominator, which in my opinion has tainted the LCC market here. Your product is not in the same league as these LCC carriers, so you really do need to get the message out just how far your product has come. After my experience, I would not hesitate to travel anywhere with your carrier given the outstanding value it represents when compared to a full service legacy carrier, and the service offering was more than adequate. People need to know why this is.

To be fair, there is still room for improvement in some quarters. Like all airlines and airports, Terminal information screens are vital, particularly for visitors from overseas. I noticed many of these boards were slow to update, and in some cases passengers lined up at gates for boarding, when the aircraft was in fact delayed, but no announcements made, or screens updated. These are the little things which should be getting done right. Technology means that as soon as the arriving aircraft departs, electronic messaging means someone, somewhere knows how late or early it will be in most cases, it doesn’t take much to publish this information on displays.

Also, on the whole I am not a fan of the KLIA LCC terminal. On your first visit you are simply overwhelmed by the size of the place, the different location of check-in areas, and odd signage and counter numbers. I don’t have any particular suggestions for improvements, however it just seems to be harder than it needs to be.

On the whole I am very excited about the future of your airlines, and the competition and services you provide to Australia, and beyond. I am not afraid to tell people why this is.

I thank you for your time.

Regards,
Andrew Ciseau

I’m back to F1 mode now with Silverstone cracking this weekend. We are half way through the season and I must say it’s been interesting few races for us here at Team Lotus.

Our beautiful car The Silverstone track walk

Let’s start with few highlights of my joy - Heikki reaching Q2 on merit and strategy in Barcelona was a phenomenal feeling for the whole team, and we are pulling away from our closest challengers. We also had our best result of the season so far on the streets of Monaco, which is the most famous and glamorous race of them all. Both our cars came home with Jarno and Heikki finishing at 13th and 14th respectively in the race, which was a very strong finish for us.
I had always thought that it’s hard to measure and articulate how far the team has come, as all other teams are progressing too. But Graham Watson, our Team Manager, helped explain the team’s progress in no uncertain terms and in an unambiguous manner that made me awestruck! He said: “simply look at our pit stops last year; for example, we were 7 or 8 seconds for every session, and we were generally quite happy with that; Now we are pushing for 3.5 to 4 seconds every time, and have consistently been achieving quick stops.

Jarno Heikki doing his track walk

This is unbelievable and rightfully so considering we’re up against teams who can spend half a million dollars on their equipments and training with more experience than team lotus, and still we’re right up there – at Monaco we delivered the 10th fastest pit-stop in the entire Grand Prix, which is no mean feat, but that just goes to show how far we’ve come in one area of our team. That is just pit stop; Zooming passed finishing line, we have done it three times this season and finished ahead of one of the cars of the established teams. It is a big challenge for us to find the 0.5 seconds that will propel us towards the midfield teams, but we have the right elements in place to achieve this; that is the team members.

Me & Riad Our Beauties

People have always been ‘key’ to my belief in success; I believe when you put them in the right place and give them the right tools, tremendous potential will explode. I am confident in my team that we will be World Champions in the not too distanced future, so I want everyone in Team Lotus to feel a part of that growth and to expand with it. Giving people opportunities, trusting in their capabilities and giving them confidence to realise their potential have been my style of work and this has brought about great achievements in my other business.

All in, we will definitely get there. We just need to make steps in the right direction and keep moving albeit small steps so long it’s the way forward; to grow in a measured, controlled way that gives us the best foundations for future success.

In terms of off track news, we’ve had some very productive developments for the team. Firstly we signed an agreement with Williams to make use of their wind tunnel, which doubles our abilities to test aerodynamic packages. At the moment the team have to travel back and forth to Italy, and while we will maintain our agreement with Aerolab, this means that more of the team will be able to actively and effectively work on the various tests so crucial to the development of our car. We’ll start utilising it properly in September, as our team grows and more staff come on board.

As I’m sure you know, Frank Williams has always been an incredible inspiration to me; it means so much to be able to work alongside his team and I feel proud to be working to the same level as someone who sparked my dream. We’re not far behind the Williams on track, still chasing, but we will not stop progressing.
For those of you, who are coming to Silverstone this weekend, cheer for Team Lotus!

Hi guys, I would like to apologise for another slack moment on my part. The past 3 months have not only been hectic but erratic. There was a period of 10 days or so that I actually circumvented the globe not once but thrice! Phew…

However, I must say it has been the most fruitful 3 months of my life. And, I would like to share with all of you insights of each event here starting on my recent trip to Paris Air Show at Le Bourget.

The brand new Airbus A320 NEO that will paint the sky RED!

Some of you might have read that AirAsia has concluded at the Paris Air Show the largest ever Airbus deal by number of aircraft as well as the largest ever order for aircraft in the A320 family worth US$18.5 billion. This order makes up of 200 firm orders of Airbus A320 NEO aircraft. Together with the existing 175 firm orders of Airbus A320 Classic, AirAsia is now recognized as the world’s largest airline customer of Airbus in history with an order of 375 A320 family aircraft to date.

As much as I am surprised, I’m extremely proud at the same time to learn of this. This is an important milestone in our growth, and this solidifies our position as the world’s best low-cost airline. I can still recall we first penned an order with Airbus for 40 A320 Classic aircraft back in December 2004; 6 and half years on, we increased the size of order more than 9 folds. This is incredible and a tremendous achievement for an airline that is only 10 years old. With the promising growth of our sister airlines in Thailand and Indonesia and the upcoming Philippines and Vietnam operations, I believe AirAsia, as a group, have the capacity to take up to 500 aircraft. This is backed by the continuous growth of the number of passenger we have served, from an annual passenger volume of 200,000 when we first launched as a low-cost airline in 2001 to an estimated 31 million this year.

At this juncture, I would like to attribute all honour flowing from here to my loyal and faithful management team that is ever ready in embracing innovation and technological advancements.

With the introduction of the Airbus A320 NEO aircraft, guests of AirAsia can look forward to more exciting routes over and above the 130 routes over 63 destinations in South East Asia, China, India and Australia via Bali, Indonesia that AirAsia is flying to. This is made possible by the enhanced range of this new-generation aircraft. I’m sure my route planning guys are now having a ball of time identifying destinations that are beyond the 4 hours’ range (a limitation placed on the A320 Classic) for once! This new generation of Airbus A320 NEO aircraft will definitely put us ahead of the competition and continue to be frontrunners in the ever volatile aviation industry.

Aside from the commercial benefit of enhanced range, the decision of taking up the A320 NEO aircraft is also to fulfil one of my personal crusades. Comes with large sharklets wing tip devices that boost fuel efficiency, which will enables savings of approximately 15% in fuel consumption per annum per aircraft also meant a reduction of carbon footprint by AirAsia aircraft in a world now that is already plagued by numerous natural disasters of late.

Enough said, I guess the best way to share is still visual appreciation as with the famous song goes “a picture paints a thousand words”:

Din, me and Tom Enders CEO of Airbus; and at the side are John Leahy Commercial Director Airbus and Tan Sri Rafidah Aziz Chairman of AirAsia X

Din, me, Tom and John

A cool picture of the AirAsia and GE team; me, Amin, Chris, Aireen, Kevin, Azhari and Stuart

What a hectic two weeks, it has been. First Barcelona then Monaco which was a fantastic race with Heikki finishing as the quickest driver among the new teams; then it was a whistle stop in Tokyo to collect the Nikkei prize.

What really ended the week on a high though was AirAsia being named the Best Low Cost Airline by Skytrax for the second year running. This award means a lot to us for two reasons. First it is the second consecutive year which we’ve been given the accolade and second, the Skytrax survey is an independent worldwide passenger poll. Winning this gives us public and global recognition for the hard work we put in at AirAsia. For this I’m giving our AirAsia AllStars thumbs up for a job well done.

Operating more than 2,000 flights a day to move 24 million people over 120 routes while ensuring that we keep costs down, is truly a massive logistical feat and I am very proud that we have made it to be of world class standards.
They say that being at the top can be a curse because it leaves you nothing more to aim for. I reckon that’s only true if you don’t aim to stay there. What we would really like now is to score a hat trick and win this award again next year. Ultimately we would like to one day be voted as not only the world’s best low cost airline but the world’s best airline, period.

To get there I’m well aware of ways we can make things better. That’s why we take in and listen to all feedback and complaints from our guests, no matter how small. From queues to the in-flight experience to booking and the response from our guest support; we are working out ways to improve and serve our guests better.

I realise AirAsia is a subject that evokes strong emotions from people perhaps owing to our rather unique history, but mostly because so many of you fly with us. We will never forget that it is because of our guests that we are the success we are today. So yes, we know we’re not perfect but we’re sure as hell going to try to be.

Thank you all for your support.

In New York city for the entire day. And meeting media and building the brand is part of the agenda. Have attached some of the interviews that I do abroad and it touches on many issues which includes important topics such as how do we build a worldwide brand. Recently, I had tea with The Economist and thought it might be something that you would like to see.

Here's another that I ran through with Mike Gascoyne and BBC on the Lotus F1 dream. We need to be at the forefront and be ambassadors of our brand and be passionate about our involvement. The link for BBC is as follows:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/motorsport/formula_one/8362515.stm

The essence of brand building is that we must first embrace what the brand means and what it should symbolise to the world. Armed with that, we go out with conviction and we preach that far and wide with all the latest technology and with the most effect we can.

Hope you enjoy these videos and fully embrace the value of integrating mass media with your brand. Be passionate about your brand and be all you can be. Will check back soon from New York. Have a good day all.

Are you ready for this?

Manchester United have just approached me on whether AirAsia would be interested in becoming their shirt sponsor. Yes, you read that right. The world's most famous football club wants to proudly wear shirts bearing the name and logo of a Malaysian-born global brand. Doing this would be a first for a Malaysian company and would truly solidify us as a global brand. This pure acknowledgement of us, AirAsia as a global brand to be reckoned with is simply a moment where you just step back and say, “Wow! We’re actually there right now!”.

From the business front, its simply astonishing as it clearly shows how we have progressed as a brand and that this little Malaysian company has gone so far in a mere 7 years to raised our brand to such high levels.

Heres the million dollar question, or rather the multi-million dollar question: Do I commit to the shirt sponsorship of Manchester United?

What do you think? So, should AirAsia do it? Have your say on my blog, and you may, just may soon be seeing this:

Make some noise in here people.

The past few weeks displayed to me the power of a brand. Many have asked for tips. There are tips on each of my posts. Some subtle whilst others are direct. But this post is direct one. As a businessman or businesswoman the lesson here is not to neglect your brand and always invest in your brand.

The brand.

The value of a brand is hard to quantify and investment in a brand is always hard to justify but the last few weeks showed me how important it is and how our investment over the last 6 years has paid off handsomely.

For the past few weeks, I have attended the Forbes Global CEO Conference, JATA World Congress Tourism Congress and the World Low Cost Airlines Congress 2008 as keynote speaker. What struck me was that in 6 years from all parts of the globe AirAsia has become synonymous with low cost travel.

What does that mean? It means that when someone thinks of low cost travel in Asia they think AirAsia. When someone wants to partner with a low cost airline they think AirAsia. When we need to make new contacts, look for finances and build new relationships, it's much easier as everyone knows AirAsia. So the extra revenue, time and cost savings can all arise by promoting your brand.

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