Within weeks of starting his career in aviation in the Planning Division of British Caledonian Airways, Andy was touring Africa to research the market prospects for new routes for the airline’s fleet of 707 freighters. Many such assignments were to follow, and his exposure to long-haul commercial airline operations during that era of great dynamism and turbulence in the air transport industry underscored a passion for working at the interface between the operational, commercial, and financial facets of commercial aviation which he has never lost. Through much of the ‘80s he was Commercial Director of a specialist cargo and passenger operation based throughout the UK, until leaving to found ‘Independent Aviation Group’ with two others in 1990. As MD of IAG he built the business into a successful integrated travel group with its own in-house aircraft operation utilising an innovative commercial structure which he conceived and pioneered. Since selling his interest in the company in 1999 he’s worked in aviation consultancy and interim management, which has included a two-year period as CEO of a charter airline.