SEPANG: Air Asia and MAS Kargo has emerged as Airline of the Year winners in the passenger and cargo category respectively, at the 2015 Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) Awards.
Indonesia AirAsia and Cathay Pacific bagged the Foreign Airline of the Year awards for passenger and cargo category, respectively, while Air Asia won another award – Low Cost Airline of the Year.
The Promising New Foreign Airline of the Year went to British Airways and the Best On Time Performance Airline of the Year went to Japan Airlines.
The 2015 KLIA Awards was held to recognise and reward KLIA’s business partners for their outstanding performances and services.
A total of 17 awards were presented at the event tonight which was held at Sama-Sama Hotel here.
Winners were chosen based on their achievements in their respective categories last year in according to sectors such as passenger movements, growth factor, sales performance, international recognition and service excellence.
Transport Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai, who was the guest of honour, said KLIA has provided significant contribution to Malaysia in the past two decades of its operation.
“Its rapid growth has been instrumental towards Malaysia’s economic development, opening up opportunities in trade and tourism.
“With the opening of klia2, its second terminal serving low cost carriers, KLIA currently caters to 50 million passengers a year, with over 60 airlines serving more than 120 direct destinations.
“This is indeed a far cry from our days at Subang Airport, which at its peak handled nearly 16 million passengers a year,” he said.
For service excellence award, Sinar Jernih Sdn Bhd bagged the Airport Service Quality (AQS) Highest Score and ASQ Most Improved Score awards; Care ambassador Hafizatul Husna Shamsudin won the ASQ Star Performer Award; and DR Group Holdings Sdn Bhd founder and group managing director Datuk Dahlan Rashid won the Chairman’s Award.
For food and beverages outlet of the year, the winners were Urban Food Court (Dewina Host Sdn Bhd) for the highest percentage of growth in sales achievement and Grandmama’s (Rimba JC Sdn Bhd) in the overall category.
As for the retail outlets of the year, the winners were Machines (highest percentage of growth) and Time (overall), while Travelex Worldwide Money bagged the overall service outlet of the year.
The winners for Foreign Airline of the Year according to sector went to Garuda Indonesia for Southeast Asia, China Southern for Northeast Asia and Turkish Airlines for Europe.
In the South Asia region, Biman Bangladesh Airlines bagged the award, while Oman Air won for the Middle East region and Air Mauritus for Africa.
Malaysia Airports chairman Tan Sri Dr Wan Abdul Aziz Wan Abdullah said the passenger traffic movement in KLIA for the first nine months of this year saw a growth of 4.4 per cent, compared to the same period last year.
This growth had exceeded the initial traffic forecast for this year by 2.5 per cent.
“KLIA has continued to see not only the entry of new airlines but also the introduction of new routes and increase in frequencies from existing airlines.
“Among others, the international airport had welcomed VietJet Air from Vietnam, while KLM had increased its frequency to 10 weekly flights for their Kuala Lumpur – Amsterdam route,” he said.
He added that in October, All Nippon Airways had introduced a new direct route to Haneda Airport, Tokyo from KLIA.
Japan Airlines had also introduced its Dreamliner 787-9 aircraft and Kuala Lumpur was its first destination in Asia to welcome the airline that will service the Narita – Kuala Lumpur route daily.
Lastly, Ethiopian Airlines has also introduced its 787 Dreamliner aircraft, servicing the Kuala Lumpur – Addis Ababa route.