The former CEO of Thai low cost airline Nok Air is starting a new venture, Really Cool Airlines, which promises to “Fly The Future” because:
- It will be run by “crypto-native citizens from our Really Cool Air GameFi”
- And will become the very first “GameFi airline” allowing passengers to play blockchain games
Their plan is to acquire four Airbus A350s this year to fly within the Asia Pacific region as well as from Thailand to Europe, “shatter[ing]” the “norm of standard cabin configurations and cargo management.”
Long Island Iced Tea Corp. rebranded as Long Blockchain Corp and then got delisted by NASDAQ but that was 2017, followed by the SEC delisting them entirely. It turned out to be a pump and dump scam. Saying “business + blockchain” seemed to peak in 2021, indeed it turns out that this is a bad time for an airline to be minting its own magic beans as a frequent flyer currency.
New airline with blockchain technology doesn’t have the same resonance that it did under ZIRP. Meanwhile even the company that renamed itself Meta is getting out of the VR headset business. So maybe Really Cool Airlines missed the trend?
The most important takeaway, though, is that calling a company ‘really cool’ doesn’t actually make it cool. That’s just not how cool works.
The Thai market, and low cost airline segment, are crowded spaces. It’s not clear how Really Cool Airlines will distinguish itself. They promise “a premium experience that’s beyond your wildest dreams” though I’m skeptical. However I’m certainly rooting for a former airline CEO to deliver on this promise.
(HT: One Mile at a Time)
Meh, I’ll stick with Singapore Airlines.
what can possibly go wrong!
Creating a marketing video is the easy part. Actually operating flights is what we want to see. Also, RCA is not a great name for a modern airline.