KUALA LUMPUR (May 8): Malaysia Airlines Bhd (MAB) recently pulled off an impressive RM15 billion debt restructuring exercise — which saw it eliminate RM10 billion of debt from its balance sheet — in 4½ months. It comes at a time when many other airlines are still in talks with their lessors and creditors about a restructuring plan.

The national flag carrier was also given a new lease of life by its controlling shareholder Khazanah Nasional Bhd, which provided interim funding of RM1.1 billion earlier this year and pledged a further RM3.6 billion capital injection into the company over the next five years.

But rescuing the airline has come as no surprise given numerous transformation efforts undertaken in the past two decades, where the goal for sustainable profits remains elusive.

As MAB kicks off a new five-year turnaround plan aimed at making it cash flow positive by 2023, it gets another shot to get it right.

But this time, tackling headwinds will be tougher than ever amid an ongoing pandemic.

In the latest issue of The Edge Malaysia weekly, MAB group CEO Captain Izham Ismail talks about its Long Term Business Plan 2.0 and why he is convinced that this time the plan will work.

Read more about it in The Edge Malaysia weekly’s May 10 edition.

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