AirAsia X’s founding CEO shares how the carrier navigated the 2008 financial crisis

In 2007, Azran Osman-Rani got a call from Malaysian entrepreneur Tony Fernandes of AirAsia, who asked the executive to helm a new project: an airline that specializes in low-cost, long-haul flights.

Despite not having had any experience in the airline industry, Osman-Rani joined the venture, which was eventually known as AirAsia X. And four short months after he came on board, the carrier launched its first flight from Kuala Lumpur to Gold Coast, Australia.

However, the company’s success was quickly overshadowed by the 2008 global financial crisis, which caused AirAsia X’s credit lines to dry up and oil prices to go haywire.

On this episode of Startup Snapshot, we dive into Osman-Rani’s experiences at the early days of AirAsia X, from when he started up the new airline to the moment when it almost went bust.

Timecodes:

00:00 – En route to a make-or-break pitch meeting
01:27 – This is the story of Azran Osman-Rani
01:46 – Life before AirAsia X
03:03 – Getting the call to join the airline business
03:57 – Not his first time diving headfirst into something new
05:15 – Tony Fernandes’ proposition
07:38 – Taking a leap of faith
08:20 – Started with nothing but a few PowerPoint slides
08:37 – Finding his co-founder
10:00 – The intense first four months at AirAsia X
11:35 – AirAsia X’s first flight
12:31 – When the world plunged into the 2008 global financial crisis
12:57 – Volatile oil prices
16:30 – Stranded with barely any capital
17:09 – Riding the London Tube to get to that fateful pitch meeting
20:25 – Getting thrown a lifeline
22:27 – A short-lived relief
23:11 – Preview of the next episode

Download the full transcript here.

Featured people:

• Azran Osman-Rani, founding CEO of long-haul budget airline AirAsia X, and co-founder and CEO of digital health therapeutics platform Naluri

Background reading:

• The AirAsia X CEO who left the corporate world to be his own boss
• 30 Days and 30 Years by Azran Osman-Rani