Mokulele Airlines - December, 2008

Here's one I'm sure most of you have never heard of. Mokulele Airlines is a Hawaiian inter-island operator. They formerly flew only turboprops, but Republic needed a place for some of its small jets, and with a cash infusion in Mokulele, they found a place for them in Hawaii.

From BNET:

Republic has been a big fan of doling out money to help carriers get on their feet. They’ve done it for US Airways, Midwest, and Frontier, and they’ve now done it for Mokulele in Hawai’i as well. Now they’re taking it a step further, and apparently they want to get into the business of running an airline.
Originally, Republic provided the aircraft for Mokulele to run an interisland operation and they added an $8 million loan to help them get started. It didn’t take long for Mokulele to burn through all that money, but instead of just shutting the operation down, Republic apparently thinks it can do better.
Now, Republic will take some of the $8 million loan, invest additional equity, and turn that into a 50 percent stake in the airline.
This seems to be confirmation that Republic sees real opportunity in the inter-island market. So, they’ve decided to take control, and that’s weird. Republic has long been an operator, a carrier focused on running a solid operation for its marketing partners. Now, Republic has crossed the line, and that can be a whole different world

Here's a video of a Mokulele E170: