Word: prasarttong
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Those began in 1989, when Bangkok Airways owned just two planes and had nowhere to land them. At the time, national carrier Thai was opening up the skies to competition?provided the competition didn't fly on Thai's routes. Prasarttong-Osoth honed in on the bucolic island of Koh Samui, a 20-hour train and ferry ride away from Bangkok. The lack of an airport wasn't a problem: the former surgeon, who comes from a family construction empire, decided to build his own. He couldn't get financing so he sold one of his family's buildings...
What Bangkok Airways does have in common with the Western regionals is that it also makes money. Despite a slight dip in October, earnings were up 33% last year to $2.7 million. Says CEO Prasert Prasarttong-Osoth: "We've been growing at least 20% a year since we started regular flights...
Genial and plain-spoken, 69-year-old Prasarttong-Osoth attributes the company's success to its focus on tourism?especially to cultural destinations?courting the oft-sneered-at holidaymaker rather than the business traveler. "Tourists travel all week long," he says. "Businessmen are more demanding and can only travel a few days a week. Where's the money to be made in that?" On average, his flights are 75% full, and 93% of those passengers are international tourists. Tourists for whom Prasarttong-Osoth has great plans. As part of his Mekong region tourism development scheme, Prasarttong-Osoth has started building...
...unesco-listed sites of Luang Prabang in Laos, the ancient Vietnamese capital of Hue and the Khmer ruins of Angkor in Cambodia. Travelers can visit all four sites in eight days for about $1,000 including hotels. Or they can purchase individual flights for a customized itinerary. Says Prasarttong-Osoth: "Even those traveling for a short time will be able to get an understanding of this area's incredible history." And get a taste of incredible Bangkok Airways...
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