AirAsia to transform into ‘digital travel’ firm, integrate AI into all parts of its business

After announcing its partnership with Google Cloud, AirAsia CEO Tony Fernandes gave a few examples of how the airline plans to do that.

Google Cloud CEO Diane Greene and AirAsia CEO Tony Fernandes (fourth and fifth from left, respectively) / Photo credit: Air Asia

Malaysia’s low-cost carrier AirAsia is working with Google Cloud to integrate machine learning and artificial intelligence into “every aspect of their business and culture,” it announced today.

Tony Fernandes, founder and CEO of AirAsia, mentioned a few examples of how the airline plans to do that. It is installing up to 20,000 sensors into its aircraft, allowing engineers to better time the maintenance of its planes and reduce the wastage of spare parts.

It’s looking into weather pattern prediction to enable prediction of flight delays and let it inform customers ahead of time, “so that they don’t pin voodoo dolls to my door,” Fernandes said onstage at the Google Cloud Next London event.

The airline is also exploring sentiment analysis. It could scan the pictures of passengers as they board the airplane, and compare that against pictures of them leaving. This will help AirAsia achieve its goal of having passengers leave the plane happier.

“We’re transforming ourselves from an airline into a digital travel company,” says Fernandes. The airline will explore different business models and reduce its exposure to volatile oil prices.

It will launch BigLife, a lifestyle site that it describes as a combination of Kayak, Tripadvisor, Groupon, and eBay. BigLife will incorporate all of AirAsia’s digital investments under its digital arm RedBeat Ventures.

This includes payments app BigPay, in-flight wifi service Rokki, online marketplace Ourshop, and logistics services RedBox and RedCargo.

“It’s a huge mission, but we’ve never done anything easy,” says Fernandes.

This coverage was part of a trip sponsored by AirAsia.