Jerusalema Air? New airline SA offers free flights under a winning name

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• A new airline is coming, owned by the founder of kulula.com and a local airline leasing company.
• You’ve launched a contest to find a name, and the person who gets a winning name could get a year of free travel.
• Some of the pioneers in social media are Mzansi Airlines and Ubuntu Air.
• For more articles, visit www.businessinsider.co.za.

As part of a new competition to name the country’s last airline, South Africans have until October 2 to suggest a name.

Some social media pioneers have emerged, with names like Ubuntu Air and Mzansi Airways among the most common suggestions for naming the airline, which will be a joint venture between local aircraft leasing company Global Aviation and the founder of kulula.com, Gidon Novick. Global Aviation has been doing business in SA for almost two decades and also operates charter flights.

Jonathan Ayache, a former Uber Africa executive, is also involved in the new venture, and Novick said the new airline’s business model was inspired by Uber. He wants the airline to be as tech-oriented as Uber, as well as just as “customer obsessed.”

The new airline is entering an industry paralyzed. Comair, which owns kulula and manages British Airways in SA, is in rescue operations and is on the ground. SAA, also in business rescue, only performs international repatriation flights. SAA-owned Mango, which still flies locally, may be suspended shortly after SAA Technical, which performs its maintenance, said this weekend that it will no longer provide these services, unless its unpaid bills are settled.

FlySafair, which does its own maintenance, is the only airline not under imminent threat, although the pandemic and the shutdown have decimated demand for flights.

“The opportunity is to make a fresh start and take advantage of record low input costs and a wealth of talented and skilled people. The airline is targeting a cost base that is 30% lower than existing carriers using a fleet of Airbus A320s, “Novick told Fin24. The first flight, between Johannesburg and Cape Town, is scheduled for December 2020.

But first you need a name, and the airline launched a competition to find a name that is “unique, aspirational, and cool.” By selecting your name, you could earn 12 roundtrip flights for you and a member, to be used within 12 months of being awarded.

There has been no shortage of names suggested on social media, with some of the suggestions further left, including Wakanda Air, DjyRyNie, and Lekker Airlines.

Other suggested names on social media include:

The winner will be announced on October 9 and the names can be entered at Brandnewairline.co.za

Letting the public choose a name can be a way to create free publicity, and last month Uzbekistan launched a contest to rename its regional airports in a bid to boost tourism.

But it can backfire: In the UK, a public vote to name a polar research ship overwhelmingly turned it over to ‘Boaty McBoatface’. In the end, the organizers decided to ignore the public vote and went with Sir David Attenborough from RRS.