Podcast: Motu Link to support French Polynesian community with local backing

Jeff Lee
Hello and welcome to another episode of cargo facts connect, the podcast of cargo facts, the publication of record for the air cargo and freighter aircraft industries for over 40 years. I’m Jeff Lee, editor of cargo facts and it’s Friday, the 18th of July. In Toulouse, France, an ATR 72-500 freighter will soon emerge in the colors of an interesting new carrier called Motu Link Airline. This startup, based on the French Polynesian island of Tahiti in the South Pacific Ocean, is preparing to launch operations as the first airline in the region focusing only on cargo after successfully crowdfunding that aircraft. My colleague, Senior Associate Editor Robert Luke, and I recently talked to Motu Link’s CEO, Alexandre Mu, and head of marketing and communications, Judith Rodriguez, to find out more.

Jeff Lee
Well, Alex and Judith, very nice to meet you. There’s a lot to talk about, but before we go into details, why don’t you just introduce the story behind this new airline that you’re setting up?

Alexandre Mu
Motu Link Airline was created to meet a clear logistical need across French polynesia’s widely dispersed islands. And the project was licensed in 2021 and was restructured in 2024 after market analysis to focus exclusively exclusively on dedicated Inter Island cargo operations. And the founding team includes aviation and logistics professionals with strong words in the territory. So Motu Link Airline’s mission is to provide a relabel regular and community based cargo solution to support the economy activity, public services and everyday needs across the the archipelagos, you know. We are not just building a cargo airline, but we are building a tool for the territory.

Judith Rodriguez
What you need to know about French Polynesia is that it’s very, very wide. So it’s about, I think 1300 miles from the furthest point to the other. So it’s basically the size of Europe and you have about 120 islands, which represents like, not even a small part of France, but in a huge, huge, huge ocean. So it’s very complicated at the moment to get anything go through. So what Alex and the founders did a few years back was make analysis about the market and what was happening because we do have some local airlines over here, but non focus on cargo. So most of the cargo goes through boats, but it’s very long because it’s so far away. So some islands don’t get any food or anything for at least three weeks or maybe. Once every few months. So that’s a huge issue. And we don’t have a lot of planes place in the planes of both companies working here, which only does a passenger, so they have very, very small amount of place and there’s clearly a need for the entire territory and the entire entire population to get some food, to get some fresh food as well because we live on the ocean. Most of the the islands are built on corals, so you cannot grow food everywhere as well so. That’s a huge analysis we did back a few years ago and then at the beginning was supposed to be a mix of passenger and cargo, and then it changed to only cargo because the need is very is much more important. So we’re trying to build something that will help as much as we can. The local population across the five archipelagos and the entire the entirety of French Polynesia.

Alexandre Mu
And just to to give you a a little example. Some islands that are connected by boat. Pass ship in in one week or connected by by aircraft in one hour, you know.

Judith Rodriguez
Yeah, the furthest place is about like 5 hours flights, but it’s seven days by boat. So yeah, that logistic issues that are trying to deal with.

Jeff Lee
Yeah, really makes a difference. So it’s been a few years, right since this the whole idea started developing more into a firm plan. Right now, what’s the the rough time frame that you know you want to really, you know, the whole project to take off and you could really start operating and helping the people of the archipelago?

Judith Rodriguez
Well, the goal is to start as soon as possible, but as I mentioned earlier, it’s not that easy to get through all of the paperwork and getting a plane and getting.
It to work. So the goal is to start as soon as possible, but realistically our goal is end of Q3 at most and hopefully not later. The plan is currently being finished in France and should be available in in the next few weeks. The only question remaining is when will we be able to bring it to French Polynesia? And when will we have the necessary paperwork done with all of our local institution? So yeah, hopefully, end of Q3 we start the operations.

Alexandre Mu
Yeah. We have to resolve 3 three main points first, firstly the we are waiting to get the from the French Aviation Authority, the agreement to operate in French Polynesia. We have just get The the local license which authorizes us to to operate in French Polynesia. And the the the ferry flight of the aircraft from Toulouse, you know.

Robert Luke
Understood.

Alexandre Mu
And everything would be good.

Robert Luke
Listening to you breakdown the archipelago of the French Polynesian islands. Of those 120 that you mentioned, how many are accessible with airport infrastructure in place?

Alexandre Mu
Yeah, we have only around 47 airports accessible for for the ATR 72.

Judith Rodriguez
But also it’s 118 islands, but only about 85 are inhabited. So we don’t have to go through all of them, but yeah, about a little less than 50 have actual. Airports. Well, kind of. Airports, at least lane, but not we cannot get to all of them with the ATR we have. So that’s another logistical issues, but we’re doing with what we can.

Robert Luke
Let’s talk a little bit about what’s really interesting about your your strategy here. It sounds like you’re funding raising manager Pierre Poher launched your Fenua finance crowdfunding. Tell tell us a little bit about that and why you decided to take that approach.

Alexandre Mu
I’m motoring raised more than 3.65 million dollars you know equity for crowdfunding campaign and allowing individuals to invest directly in the airline and this is not a traditional crowdfunding effort. It was an equity based participatory investment offering real shares in the company.

Judith Rodriguez
It was very, very important to us to make sure the local population could and had the opportunity to invest with as much as they could, so the investment campaign started as around $100 per person. That was a base. And then you could put anything you wanted between that and we don’t have the detail because we worked with a financements. So it’s private data, so we don’t know exactly what’s the middle ground, how much they did put, but we do know that around 70% of the campaign was founded by local people, which makes a lot of sense with our strategy and what we want to build here. And the fact that we’re really building in cargo lines for the population and with the population. So it was very important to give them the opportunity to invest as well in the campaign and make sure they get.
Return on investment later and not just crowd like classic crowdfunding where they just put your money and then that’s it.

Alexandre Mu
Yeah. So we didn’t just seek crowdfunding, but local bank also complete the project. The project’s financing plan.

Judith Rodriguez
So it was kind of a necessity to go through crowdfunding because we needed the funds and we’re only working with our funds at the moment, not with the banks. So we had to buy the plane. The crowdfunding allowed us to do that. And then when we’ll start the activities, it’ll be easier for us to get actual loans from the bank. But at the moment, the bank are still waiting for us to show our worth. And if it’s gonna work or not. Because it’s a complicate complicated territory as well, so it’s very hard to get through that.

Alexandre Mu
It was a it was an alternative opportunity for us to finance the our first aircraft because all of the banks, the local banks. Not not at all. But we’re afraid to finance a fairly fragile sector, you know.

Judith Rodriguez
That’s why also it took us so long to go through the project and it started more than five years ago. The idea, at least, but it’s taking a long time because we have to finance the whole projects and it’s not that easy to do in general, but even more so here.

Jeff Lee
So you, I mean you obviously got some very positive response from the crowd funding approach. HowI guess. How?
Happy. Were you? Or surprised at what you with the response that you got?

Judith Rodriguez
We’re pretty happy ’cause. It’s a huge amount of money we’re talking about.
It was actually the biggest amount.
The Organism, founded over the years.
So it took a long time for us to get through all of that as well, but we were very happy about how it ended and it’s even more happy that.
Three quarter of the founding went came from local people.
That showed a lot of investment and interest in what we’re doing so.
Like kind of made us very proud of doing that and making sure the project works for the population more than just getting a plane and making it work.
But.
Yeah, just happy in general because over the months and the years.
We see the.
Involvement and interest of the local population.
And even in more isolated island than Tahiti.
And it’s very nice to see with number that the interest is real and they’re very much waiting for us to work and to operate. So that can makes their life easier.
So it was just an overall.
Happy ending for us and happy beginning here.

Alexandre Mu
This project was initiated from a couple of years ago, four years for 20/21.
And we are really looking forward to starting operation because there are high expectations from Islanders around the project and as it will bring many.
Benefits to our to our economy and further open up our islands.

Jeff Lee
Yeah, it’s so. I guess it’s not surprising that there was such a response from the crowdfunding. So going back to the aircraft. The ATR 72 is not the only type that in this category that can serve, you know all these islands. How did you eventually decide to to go for the ATR 72 as opposed to, you know, other similar types?

Alexandre Mu
The ATR is the best aircraft ever. Motu Link is currently working with ATR. The aircraft are highly compatible with Ireland’s condition shop runways when they read payloads and frequent operations. he Ato 72 was selected for its robustness, versatility and availability.
Importantly.
This 80 model has historical link with French Polynesia.
Having first been introduced in the territory by Artet and since three years now, yeah, this adds a local dimension to the relationship between the the the region and the manufacturer. And we are also exploring other models within the ATR family.
As it plans for future growth, I mean. And we are not close.
To the idea of working with other manufacturers, the opportunity just hasn’t presented itself.
We can talk in again, talking about the Embraer.

Judith Rodriguez
I just want to add as well.
There’s also a very simple question of availability and what we were allowed to found in the last few months and the last few years trying to find an airplane, making sure it works, making sure it’s in good a good state.
So it was also one of the big points and ATR offered us a very good playing.
That they repurposed for us. They’re very helpful.
Pull in the way they’re working with us.
So it was.
It also helped us making that choice and also their friends.
So it’s also it always easier to work with them, but it’s also a question of availability. What we found, what matched our expectation and needs.So ATR did answer all of that.
So that’s why we went with them.

Alexandre Mu
Yeah, and there are many factors to consider, mainly the technical constraints and as most of the infrastructure is is how do you say it’s like an unpaved runway, you know? Rudimentary.

Robert Luke
Am I correct in saying that there’s due to the presence of the ATR 72 throughout the French Polynesian islands?
You have the maintenance and logistical support infrastructure already in place for this aircraft type as well.

Judith Rodriguez
Yeah.
Could say that because it’s the most used aircraft.
Or both.
Air Tahitian Air Moana, which are the only two other airlines present on the territory.
So you have the knowledge you have the infrastructure, you have people who knows how to work on it as well.
So it kind of makes sense.
To work with ATR as well.

Robert Luke
OK, that that being said, how important is it to get the second aircraft into your fleet as soon as you all take delivery of the first one?

Judith Rodriguez
It’s very important for us because as we’re getting closer and closer to launch, we realize that one.
ATR with 8.5 tons is not enough for what we asked to.
Get from one point to the other and we could have another plane just for two destination like 2 island just to get food back. All of the crops and stuff like that.
So it’s very important for us to already start working on that.
We don’t have a clear date, date or deadline yet, but we have to think about that because we know already that the plane will be full pretty fast because there’s a huge need. We did actually a huge market analysis and we asked a huge, we asked questions through a form to all of the population and had about 350 answers from all around the island. And we realized that they needed more than we realized.
So we know for sure that the plane will be really quickly full and we don’t have enough days and hours in the week to answer all of their needs of the territory. So we have to think about the second aircraft already.

Alexandre Mu
But we we need to transport a huge amount of goods to and from the islands, including farmers projects. And seafood production.

Robert Luke
in addition to the startup.
Are you going to do you see?
Motu Link airline working as a single entity by itself? Or do you see collaborations with some of the C carriers that are already delivering logistics to to kind of augment their delivery times and move some of the bigger components that might take them longer to ship throughout the Archipelagos.

Judith Rodriguez
So we are actually already working with the people working with boats because as we said, lots of islands, not that many have actual.
Airports, so most of the island or just getting food boats and because the turret is so big, the boats gives most of fresh fruit to the first island that go to.
And then it stops. So they only have like.
Building tools and stuff like that that do not or not perishable.
So the idea as well is to make sure with the plane we get some fresh food and goods to another island where the boat stops and then it can go to other islands.
And make sure everyone can get the same amount of fresh foods and stuff like that.
So we are actually working with the boat people and trying to help them work better as well.

Alexandre Mu
Yeah. Our business model is unlike any other you know.
In in other country elsewhere.
You would have used the eightios for ecommerce like FedEx did.
But here in in French Polynesia, it is to feed the population you know.

Judith Rodriguez
And also bring back goods cause even if the media is a big islands, if you get fish from the other archipelagos, the price goes down in Tahiti. Like it’s kind of double at the moment. Tahiti compared to the Tuamotus, for example.
So if we get food back, we get.
Most of the free fruits and vegetables come from other archipelagos, so we get all of that back. It kind of helps the global economics of French Polynesia, so everyone wants to.
Help and make sure we do something good.
So that’s why we it’s so easy for us to work with other companies.
He’s like we’re working with the other companies we talked about.
We’re working with air tahili because we need the help in Ireland. We’re working with the both people, working with lots of people to make sure everything goes through and that it makes sense for the population as well. So it’s a global project for all of us in French Polynesia.
It’s not just us and our planes, just what can be built between us and all of the bridges we can make.

Robert Luke
Where do you see Motu link airline 5 years from now? Strategically and from a vision standpoint, and to give you more in depth to that question, how many aircraft do you see operating in your fleet?
How many potential partnerships do you see with other carriers, whether they’re air or sea or land logistics and even perhaps even your own work?
Force in potential warehouse storage or distribution. Since this is something that’s beyond just your vision, but more of a island supported backed vision that they want to see, stick around for a very long time.

Judith Rodriguez
I think when a very personal point of view, the ultimate goal would be to be.
A clear point and clear airlines for the entire South Pacific and to what we’re building now in France to be able to extend it to all all the countries around us because there’s about like 20 countries in the Pacific that have the same needs.
So if we can, we can create a platform, an exchange between all of us and make sure we all get.
The same goods.
The same access to everything and also make sure you have an emergency access as well, which is a huge problematic here.
So if we can create something that goes beyond French Polynesia and can be a very identified.
Company to help and to give access to everyone to same thing.
I think that’d be the ultimate goal.
I don’t know how how many planes we need.
I think the French Polynesia cargo only maybe three to four would be enough.

Alexandre Mu
Yeah, it’s 2 to 4 aircraft.

Judith Rodriguez
But we’ll also need some smaller ones to deal with the other islands that have very short names. But then if we go further than French Polynesia, I don’t know. We can get to any point because as I said, 20 countries, thousands of islands, thousand of kilometers in miles. You can do a lot. In the Pacific, is it not? No one has done it yet, so you never know.

Alexandre Mu
Yeah, yeah. We can dream big, but have to be cautious. But we we are aiming to have four aircraft and and then we we will see how the market behaves.

Judith Rodriguez
Yeah, the the main focus now is French Polynesia because it’s the territory we know and we know the needs. We know what they want. The prices we know all of that. So I think the next few years would be focused on creating the right service and the right platform for French Polynesia. And when that is done, hopefully in five years we’ll do that. Then we’ll think about what’s next and with who, we can work as well. Around us. So, lots of things.

Alexandre Mu
Give us, give us. Give us one year at least.

Robert Luke
We’re willing to give you more than that. How about that?

Judith Rodriguez
Thank you.

Jeff Lee
Well, it was nice talking to you and to learn more about your your whole project. Good luck. We look forward to seeing the aircraft make that long journey from Toulouse to Tahiti. And thank you. Thank you so much Judith and Alex.

Alexandre Mu
Thank you so much. Judith and Alex. Man, it’s great. Pleasure talking to both of you.

Alexandre Mu
OK man. Thanks a lot again.

Jeff Lee
Thanks. Well, I’m sure will talk soon, but good luck.

Jeff Lee
That was Alexandre Mu, CEO of Motu Link Airline, and Judith Rodriguez, head of marketing and communications at Motu Link. And that’s all the time we have today. For more coverage of the freighter aircraft and AAM market, visit cargofacts.com. Thank you very much for tuning in, and join us again next time.