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Nathaniel Fetalvero · · 2 min readTurbulence ahead: AirAsia X’s founding CEO on how the carrier pulled through crises
When AirAsia X came out of the 2008 global financial crisis just a year after the company began operations, its founding CEO Azran Osman-Rani thought it would be smooth sailing from then on.
He was quickly proven wrong, however, when the long-haul budget airline had to face one crisis after another, from 2010 to 2012. Even after a successful initial public offering in 2013, AirAsia X faced what Osman-Rani calls an annus horribilis in 2014, when three planes from Southeast Asian carriers fell from the sky, causing the demand for air travel to plummet significantly.
On this episode of Startup Snapshot, Osman-Rani shares how AirAsia X made its way through turbulence after turbulence and discusses the events that eventually led to his departure from the airline industry.
Timecodes:
00:00 – Remember how you felt on New Year’s Day 2020?
00:45 – AirAsia X’s short-lived moment of bliss
01:40 – This is the story of Azran Osman-Rani
04:42 – When oil prices soared, again
07:00 – What eventually killed the London route
08:30 – Weathering one natural disaster every year, from 2010 to 2012
09:36 – The impact on AirAsia X’s bottom line
11:32 – Begging investors for money to survive
13:13 – Restructuring routes and gaining market dominance
14:24 – Dealing with the closure of the London route
15:20 – A successful IPO in 2013
16:04 – 2014: The annus horribilis
18:37 – No time to be emotional
19:30 – Disagreements with the board and Osman-Rani’s departure from AirAsia X
20:21 – Getting a call from Patrick Grove to start Iflix
21:03 – Early challenges and eventual successes at Iflix
23:09 – The inspiration to start another business: Naluri
25:13 – Osman-Rani’s advice for struggling entrepreneurs
Download the full transcript here.
Featured people:
- Azran Osman-Rani, founding CEO of long-haul budget airline AirAsia X, former CEO of Iflix Malaysia, and co-founder of digital health therapeutics platform Naluri
Background reading:
Editing by Eileen C. Ang
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The 2008 global financial crisis was just the first of many challenges that the carrier had to endure.
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