Aviation strategy & capital advisory

The numbers tell you what happened.

Experience tells you what happens next.

Aviation and finance advisory for investors, airlines, airports and government. We connect past decisions to present conditions and unpack what comes next. Beyond the frameworks.

Shaped By Industry Experience

Areas of Expertise

Financial markets dashboard showing live index performance and price movements
Decoding aviation→

For Investors

Operating dynamics translated into terms investors can act on.

  • One-on-One Calls
  • Group Briefings
  • Fractional Advisory

View from an airline cabin window above the cloud layer
Operator experience→

For Airlines

Strategy, network, commercial and loyalty leadership across low-cost and full-service carriers.

  • C-suite advisory
  • Fractional leadership
  • Ad-hoc consulting projects
Airport terminal seating area overlooking the tarmac with parked aircraft
The airline's view→

For Airports

Decode what an airline weighs before committing capacity, and where the commercial case holds beyond the launch incentives.

  • On-Call Counsel
  • Air Service Development Strategy
Trusted Expert

Principle-led Consulting

Leith Salem, Founder and Principal of 2010 Advisory
Leith Salem
Founder & Principal

Aviation is in my DNA, and finance runs right alongside it. I'm Leith Salem, founder of 2010 Advisory, a practice built to make aviation legible to the investors who back it and the operators who run it.

  • 15 years across aviation and investment banking
  • Senior strategy leader at Virgin Australia, from administration to IPO
  • Led Qantas International's largest network expansion in nearly two decades
  • INSEAD Global Executive MBA, class of 2027
Learn more about Leith →
Sharp analysis on the aviation industry

Boardroom Briefings

Virgin Australia's Shrinking Network: A Short-Term Optimisation with Long-Term Costs
2026.08Operators

Virgin Australia's Shrinking Network: A Short-Term Optimisation with Long-Term Costs

To infinity and back again. Virgin Australia's network is shrinking just as Qantas Group's expands — and the gap is structural, not cyclical.

Go West, They Said. The Register Says Otherwise.
2026.06Airports

Go West, They Said. The Register Says Otherwise.

The government made a fanfare of Emirates and Qatar receiving increased traffic rights to Western Sydney. The bilateral arrangements tell a different story. We examine what would actually compel UAE or Qatar carriers to grow into Western Sydney — or deploy those rights somewhere else entirely.

Qantas does not let flight credits expire. Virgin Australia should do the same.
2026.06Operators6 min

Qantas does not let flight credits expire. Virgin Australia should do the same.

Australia's two major airlines now sit on opposite sides of a simple test: when a customer's flight doesn't happen, whose money is it?

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