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The low-cost airline AirAsia is considering expanding its flights in the Middle East, with the possibility of coming to the Abu Dhabi and Dubai markets.
“The Middle East has fueled my imagination,” said Tony Fernandez, the founder of the company, in an interview on the sidelines of the Qatar Economic Forum in Doha. We can open up a whole new market.”
Regarding prices that have deviated to record levels, Fernandez said: “We do not want airline ticket prices to rise more, we want to reduce them and stimulate more demand.”
The latter’s words came after airline ticket prices peaked in the global market, where his company also operates, in the wake of the Covid pandemic, with capacity and staff unable to keep up with the sharp rise in demand in Southeast Asia and the Middle East.
Air Asia aims to keep up with the high demand by launching additional routes in two other countries in the ASEAN region, Fernandez told Bloomberg TV last December. The company also announced plans to enter Cambodia, and also aspirations to bring financing from investors in the Middle East. For the business of the parent group “Capital A”, which is still recovering from the epidemic.
“It’s really time to grow in Asia when we were struggling to survive,” Fernandez added. Pointing out that with the recovery of travel, Air Asia will restart all of its 210 aircraft within about two months. and that the fleet should grow to 300 aircraft in the next four to five years, with annual passenger traffic increasing to 150 million from about 80 million.
