Air Asia X CEO is ready to take off from Avalon

THE chief executive officer of Air Asia X made two visits to Geelong within 24 hours last week, and is looking forward to a shorter drive for his international flight back to Malaysia from December 5.

Benyamin Ismail was the keynote speaker at Committee for Geelong’s annual dinner and Leaders for Geelong (LfG) graduation, held at GMHBA Stadium on November 1.

He said his only other visit to Geelong before the graduation was the previous day for a two-hour lunch, but he had now seen all the sights.

Mr Ismail cited the help of Avalon Airport chief executive officer Justin Giddings as critical in making the “bold decision” to move Air Asia’s operations from Tullamarine to Avalon, which he called one of his biggest achievements.

“He’s been on my case for the past five years, and we finally made that decision to move, and I’m really, really excited.

“I went there this morning, and I looked at Avalon – five months ago it was just a farm that kind of looked like an airport, but it’s great, and I can’t wait for my aircraft to land there.”

He said branding was one of the things that Air Asia was particularly good at, and the airline had been pushing the Great Ocean Road hard across its channels.

At the end of his speech, Mr Ismail generously gave all of the LfG graduates a free ticket to Kuala Lumpur – “Unfortunately it’s one ticket each, so it’s up to you if you want to bring your wife or your husband”, he quipped.