Virgin Australia Believes ‘The Future Is Here’

Transcript

Rob Sharp:So I think people have this perception that technology is always down the track, and we hear these terms avatars and chatbots and robots and artificial intelligence, and the reality is a lot of it's already here. It's here and now. We're using some of it. Airports are using some of it. So when you look at it, we're actually in a really changing environment, and we're living it right now. We're into chatbots and artificial intelligence. So in our loyalty business at the moment, we're using artificial intelligence to actually look at marketing campaigns and looking at how do we target them better. So it's an internally focused efficiency tool. We spend a lot of money on marketing, and so we're very keen to ensure that it's relevant to our customers. Likewise, we bought a company called Torque which is a data analytics company, and they develop very smart mathematical models for predicting customers' behaviour. And with this data-rich world that we have and we're entering into, we believe we can enhance our customer service offerings and enhance the whole journey by better understanding our customers. And so we're doing a lot of work in that space as well. We have tens of millions of people who fly us. And so one of the challenges for an airline is how do you provide that sort of personal service when really you're providing a mass product in some ways? And how do you do that consistently? And that's the biggest challenge. So for me, technology does 2 things. It's exciting and it brings new innovative concepts and products that are great for customers. And an example of that's our new Wi-Fi where you'll be online connected flying to the US for your 14 hours, surfing the web or watching movies, Quite amazing what you can do now. But that's an example of an innovation. There's a lot of these technologies actually help with that consistency as well. So we're moving more and more into real time. We always grab our phones and look at things constantly. And for an airline, it means how do we get that real-time information to our frontline staff so that you can actually make that journey frictionless? And that's what customers want. They want to get from A to B. And that's what you're doing. They like to have that as a seamless journey, and that's the aspiration. For us, part of the face or the interaction of Virgin is through our website and our app, and it is a little clunky at the moment. It's an older generation tool, and in understanding our customer, we know that, and they're telling us, that they want more real-time information. And so there's a big step change happening. We're moving on to some new platforms, and we'll be launching that first quarter 2018, and our customers will see a massive difference. It won't be just one big bang, it'll be— the technologies are iterative, so you can keep loading up new features, and we'll continue to develop that over coming months. But it will be very visible for people, and about 40% of our business traffic actually use those apps regularly. So I'm very much looking forward to giving them an enhanced experience. Look, it is aimed for anyone who wants to use the app, but in practice, people who travel regularly tend to use these tools. And the reason they do it is that they're time-poor, they're cutting it fine getting to the airport. They want to know what gate the plane's leaving, are they checked in, is it on time, and if there's a delay, can they go to the lounge. So it's just practical information that makes life easy. One of the things that people always have an issue with is if the plane's late or it's cancelled, the communication around that. And often that can happen in real time due to weather or an engineering issue. Being able to get that information to customers absolutely helps them understand where they're at and what's happening, because otherwise they lose the control of their journey and that makes people anxious. Well, the brand is very much around innovation, being a challenger, doing things differently, and we certainly brought competition into the Australian market and that's our mission. We're still going to be doing that, so we want to keep doing things pushing the boundaries. And those boundaries are, you know, examples are around social media. You might recollect over the last sort of 5 to 10 years social media has been around, but corporates have had quite a mixed view in terms of dipping their toe into that sphere. And the reason is people can talk back to you, and that's a bit of a challenge. You know, sometimes you don't want to hear the facts. However, it's really important because it is how people communicate these days, and We use all the various channels, there's about 5 or 6, regularly, and we'll retweet, we'll share observations, we'll comment on something that hasn't worked on the day and what we're doing to fix it. Bali is a current example where the volcano's erupted, there's thousands of people stranded up in Denpasar at the moment. Social media is a really key way we're communicating with them. So it's really important, and we think that's going to be a differentiator in the future. how you communicate and use data and technology is a way that you can actually build engagement and interaction. So it's a key priority for us. Yes, look, the corporate market's definitely a target for us. We believe we bring a good product to market for them. What are we actually doing for them? A lot of it's actually around that information and ease of travel. The corporates are very clearly telling us that our mobile app isn't providing all the information they would like. But we're also looking at how do we actually come up with things that are innovative for them. So the Economy X product is one that is quite unique in the marketplace. It's been out there for a couple of months now, but we're getting a lot of corporate travellers who pay the extra $29 to actually get into a seat with extra legroom. They like the priority boarding of it and the comfort of it. So those, those innovations are very much geared to the corporate traveller. The TMCs have played a critical role there for many years and that'll continue. I think digital is actually an interesting space and it's creating some competition for all of us, including TMCs, and so it's how we use that to engage, and I think that's probably the message for all of us, that don't take your eye off the customer and you still have a role there, but technology will definitely be an integral part of it. Well, what I came across originally was a to reconnect with John Magidti. He and I have sort of bumped into each other and worked with each other for about 20-odd years. Also, the Tiger investment and the turning of Virgin Blue into a full-service carrier with a suite of entities. So the Virgin Group these days has a cargo business, it's got a regional business, a charter business, a true loyalty program, not just a frequent flyer points program, a low-cost carrier. That was a great strategy. I could see me being able to make my mark in that space, and so I thoroughly enjoyed the Tiger experience. And on turning that business around. This opportunity came up and the Virgin brand's got all those things that I love, you know, it's innovative, it's a challenger brand, it's very much in its DNA, and it's very much a people business. So what's not to love about it? Certainly a challenge, I mean aviation's a challenge, but I'm thoroughly enjoying getting my feet under the desk. What's the future of Virgin Australia?

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