Tony Steps Aside As Airasia Boss
MUMBAI | WEDNESDAY, 5 FEBRUARY 2020 COMPANIES 5 . < Tony steps aside as AirAsia boss Chairman Kamarudin Meranun, too, relinquishes post temporarily over links to bribery scandal CHARLOTTE RYAN, YANTOULTRA NGUI identified it as the Caterham Formula & ASANTHA SIRIMANNE 1 team, founded in 2009 with London, 4 February Nasarudin Nasimuddin, chairman of car assembler Naza Group. They said irbus SE and AirAsia, the dis- the team made no profit and “was count airline built by Tony eventually disposed for £1”. A Fernandes, were inseparable for The July 2014 Farnborough deal that years, with the boisterous aviation exec- produced such fraternal bonhomie — utive gorging on ever-larger aircraft for 50 A330 wide-bodies — was sup- orders to become the manufacturer’s posed to trigger an additional $55 million biggest customer for single-aisle jets. payment, though it was never received, That happy marriage ended in acri- according to the prosecutors. mony last week after Airbus admitted to Four days after the order announce- illegally trying to sway plane sales and ment, an AirAsia executive emailed a agreed to a record $4 billion bribery set- senior Airbus employee saying that tlement. By Monday, Fernandes stepped “instead of sponsorship we want to put away from the Malaysian airline he it as a grant.” The A330 purchase was bought in 2001 and turned into one of the finalized in December, but by then the best-known brands in Asian aviation. "Caterham F1, the company alleged to have been sponsored strategy and marketing department at Fernandes was one of Airbus’s most improperly by Airbus, was at the relevant time a Formula 1 racing the center of the Airbus corruption was loyal customers, a fixture at air shows team that had gone round the globe promoting amongst others no longer in a position to fulfill its com- where he’d make a splash with huge AirAsia, AirAsia X, GE and Airbus..
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