The Future of Air Transport

Howard Millar

Deputy Chief Executive Officer & Chief Financial Officer, Ryanair

Biography

Howard Millar was appointed Chief Financial Officer and Deputy Chief Executive on January 1, 2003, having previously served as Director of Finance of Ryanair since March 1993. Between April 1992 and March 1993 he served as Financial Controller of Ryanair. Howard was the Group Finance Manager for the Almarai Group, an international food processing company with 2,700 employees in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, from 1988 to 1992..

Howard is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Certified Accountants and has a B.Sc Mgnt., (Hons) degree from Trinity College, Dublin.

Will Whitehorn

President , Virgin Galactic

Biography

Will Whitehorn joined the Virgin Group as Group Public Relations Manager in 1987. Over the next several years he was responsible for presenting Virgin’s joint venture strategy and spent several months working in Japan and began to move into a more general management role. Will worked on the strategy to expand the brand into new areas such as financial services and telecoms. From 1995 onwards, Will became part of a team developing the Virgin branded venture capital model for global expansion. In 1997 he became a director of Virgin Rail Group and in 2000, he was appointed Brand Development and Corporate Affairs Director for Virgin. In 2004 he became President of Virgin Galactic. In 2007 he took on that role in an executive capacity and became a special advisor to Sir Richard Branson. He is also a trustee of the Virgin Unite social entrepreneurship and environmental not for profit foundation.

In addition to his Virgin involvement, Will was appointed as non-executive Chairman of Next Fifteen Communications Group plc, the global technology PR consultancy, in January 2004. He is also a member of the Development Board of The University of Aberdeen. In 2007 he was also invited to join the advisory board of the BNSC (British National Space Centre). He is also a member of the first Minister of Scotland’s “GlobalScot” business mentoring network.

Mohammed Al Bulooki

Abu Dhabi Airports Company (ADAC)

Biography

Mohammed Al Bulooki was recently promoted to General Manager of Gulf Centre for Aviation Studies (GCAS), a subsidiary of Abu Dhabi Airports Company (ADAC).

Previously at ADAC, Mohammed was the Vice President of Airline Marketing and Aeronautical Revenue. In his role, Mohammed oversaw aviation business development strategies for the airports of the Capital of the UAE. His responsibilities included overseeing all existing and potential airline route development as well as developing sustainable and profitable strategies to optimize aeronautical revenue streams.

Mohammed joined ADAC in 2008 as Director of Marketing & Communications having previously worked for Etihad Airways, the national airline of the UAE, as the Corporate Planning & Strategy Manager.

Before joining Etihad, Mohammed worked at Royal Jet as Sales Manager where he was responsible for the targeted sales revenues of the company as well as its asset management. Prior to joining Royal Jet, Mohammed spent 6 years at GAMCO/ADAT as an apprentice Aircraft Engineer and held a variety of other roles including marketing.

Mohammed’s experience in the aviation industry is extensive, ranging from roles as head of corporate sales and business development from the airline’s London office, to airline corporate planning and strategy department and duties including network planning, fleet planning, and Etihad project management for Abu Dhabi Airport’s new Terminal 3.

Mohammed holds a Bachelors degree (BEng) in Air Transport Engineering from City University London and a Diploma in Aircraft Maintenance Technology from Abu Dhabi Men’s College in conjunction with Brunel College (UK).

Mike Forster

R3 Director, BAA

Biography

Mike was appointed to BAA’s Executive Committee in September 2007 initially as Strategy Director, responsible for leading the development of BAA's short, mid and long-term strategy. In 2008 he added the responsibility for Regulation and Planning but following the Government announcement in January 2009 is now focused on the delivery of the third runway at Heathrow.

In his previous role as Strategy and Development Director at Heathrow, he developed the transformation strategy including the replacement of Terminal 2 with Heathrow East, the refurbishment plans for the existing terminals, the masterplan for the regeneration of the central terminal area, and potential airport expansion through additional runway capacity.

Mike joined BAA in 1997 and was appointed Design Director in 1998. Prior to this he was a partner at Sheppard Robson Architects where he led projects including the £500m Glaxo Welcome Medicines Research Centre at Stevenage, the Welcome Trust Genome Campus at Hinxton, Cambridge and a number of research related projects.

He was appointed Terminal 5 Development and Design Director in 2002, where his role was to develop the vision for Terminal 5, capture the requirements of BAA and all stakeholders in the project brief and to ensure these requirements are delivered. During that time Mike also held the position of Group Development and Design Director.

Key dates

2009 – present R³ Director, BAA
2008 – 2009 Strategy & Regulation Director, BAA
2007 – 2008 Strategy Director, BAA
2007 - present Member, BAA,Executive Committee
2006 – 2007 Strategy and Development Director, Heathrow Airport
2005 – 2006 Business Strategy Director, Heathrow Airport
2002 – 2005 Terminal 5 Development and Design Director, BAA
Group Development and Design Director, BAA
1997 – 2002 Design Director, BAA
1987 – 1997 Partner, Sheppard Robson Architects
1980 – 1987 Architect, Sheppard Robson Architects

Other directorships/memberships

Member, CBI, London Council