Long-haul budget airline AirAsia X is likely to drop plans to fly to Japan next year, despite several airports having welcomed it, because of tough visa rules, a top official has said.
“Give me a chance now and I’d rather fly to [South] Korea, the Middle East and India ... Other countries are competing for Malaysian tourists,” AirAsia X chief executive officer Azran Osman-Rani said in an interview.
“To get a Japanese visa, a Malaysian has to visit the embassy in Kuala Lumpur twice and even then the person is not sure a visa will be issued,” he said.
The Australian-based Center for Asia Pacific Aviation (CAPA) said recently that Japan’s highly restrictive visa system virtually rules out Malaysia-based AirAsia X from starting a service next year as it had planned.
CAPA said Japan would have to remove the visa restrictions — which are highly inconvenient to travelers with non-refundable low-cost tickets — to make it attractive to regional budget carriers.
Azran said that when he visited airports in Japan this month, the operators were eager to accept AirAsia X flights, to compensate as full-service carriers like Qantas cut back their frequencies.
“I am looking at all airports except Narita due to congestion and high costs,” he said, adding that AirAsia X was keen to fly to Japan as a wealthy country with a huge population.
If Japanese authorities were to come up with a good proposal, “I will change my plan,” he said.
An affiliate of regional low-cost carrier AirAsia and Virgin Group, AirAsia X was launched in January last year. AirAsia and AirAsia X share common shareholders, including AirAsia founder and CEO Tony Fernandes.
Richard Branson’s Virgin Group has taken a 20 percent stake in the airline and the British billionaire has vowed to ensure that the project turns a profit.
Azran said the carrier would take delivery of two brand new A330-300 by the end of this year. It has signed a deal with Airbus to buy 25 A330-300 aircraft.
AirAsia X now has one A330-300 aircraft. It currently mounts a four-weekly return flight to Australia’s Gold Coast that began last November and also flies to Hangzhou, China.
It plans to offer six return flights per week between Perth and Kuala Lumpur starting on Nov. 2.
Nvidia Corp yesterday unveiled its new high-speed interconnect technology, NVLink Fusion, with Taiwanese application-specific IC (ASIC) designers Alchip Technologies Ltd (世芯) and MediaTek Inc (聯發科) among the first to adopt the technology to help build semi-custom artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure for hyperscalers. Nvidia has opened its technology to outside users, as hyperscalers and cloud service providers are building their own cost-effective AI chips, or accelerators, used in AI servers by leveraging ASIC firms’ designing capabilities to reduce their dependence on Nvidia. Previously, NVLink technology was only available for Nvidia’s own AI platform. “NVLink Fusion opens Nvidia’s AI platform and rich ecosystem for
CAUSE AND EFFECT: China’s policies prompted the US to increase its presence in the Indo-Pacific, and Beijing should consider if this outcome is in its best interests, Lai said China has been escalating its military and political pressure on Taiwan for many years, but should reflect on this strategy and think about what is really in its best interest, President William Lai (賴清德) said. Lai made the remark in a YouTube interview with Mindi World News that was broadcast on Saturday, ahead of the first anniversary of his presidential inauguration tomorrow. The US has clearly stated that China is its biggest challenge and threat, with US President Donald Trump and US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth repeatedly saying that the US should increase its forces in the Indo-Pacific region
ALL TOGETHER: Only by including Taiwan can the WHA fully exemplify its commitment to ‘One World for Health,’ the representative offices of eight nations in Taiwan said The representative offices in Taiwan of eight nations yesterday issued a joint statement reiterating their support for Taiwan’s meaningful engagement with the WHO and for Taipei’s participation as an observer at the World Health Assembly (WHA). The joint statement came as Taiwan has not received an invitation to this year’s WHA, which started yesterday and runs until Tuesday next week. This year’s meeting of the decisionmaking body of the WHO in Geneva, Switzerland, would be the ninth consecutive year Taiwan has been excluded. The eight offices, which reaffirmed their support for Taiwan, are the British Office Taipei, the Australian Office Taipei, the
WARNING: From Jan. 1 last year to the end of last month, 89 Taiwanese have gone missing or been detained in China, the MAC said, urging people to carefully consider travel to China Lax enforcement had made virtually moot regulations banning civil servants from making unauthorized visits to China, the Control Yuan said yesterday. Several agencies allowed personnel to travel to China after they submitted explanations for the trip written using artificial intelligence or provided no reason at all, the Control Yuan said in a statement, following an investigation headed by Control Yuan member Lin Wen-cheng (林文程). The probe identified 318 civil servants who traveled to China without permission in the past 10 years, but the true number could be close to 1,000, the Control Yuan said. The public employees investigated were not engaged in national