Keynote Interview with Steven Greenway, CEO of flyadeal, at Aviation Festival Asia 2025: “After being launched digitally, how is flyadeal keeping digitalisation at the forefront of their growth?”
Last week, Saudia Group announced an order for 10 A330-900 aircraft for its subsidiary, flyadeal. The new additions will support flyadeal’s rapid growth and contribute to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s expansion efforts under Vision 2030.
In February, flyadeal’s CEO, Steven Greenway discussed the airline’s responsibility within the Kingdom’s wider transformation, highlighting the low-cost carrier’s (LCC) role in connecting more regions across Saudi Arabia and beyond. Speaking to the airline’s fast-paced growth, Greenway described the unexpected opening of regional markets:
“If you asked me before Christmas, would we be flying to Baghdad, I would’ve said, ‘No way in hell.’ Now, we’re flying to Baghdad with our own aircraft. Lebanon, Syria, Iraq are now opened up to us within a matter of months where we never had that. We didn’t even have that in our budget. I’ve had to go back for extra resources because we hadn’t planned to be doing this. And so, we’re moving quite rapidly as the market is changing quite quickly.“
Alongside the expansion story, Greenway also shared insights into the airline’s digital strategy, discussing passenger preferences and demands, as well as the key to catering for a digitally savvy population.
On building flyadeal’s mobile app experience, Greenway explained while he wanted an app that could support 99 per cent of customer interactions (including refunding, changes, split bookings etc), there is a simple secret to creating an app that becomes widely adopted:
“Here’s the reality check: as long as you build something that is intuitive, that works, that is simple enough and so forth, it’s adopted well. I think our mobile app gets 4.9 out of 5 on the App Store […] That’s the easy part, the hard part is…”
Watch the full interview below for more on supply chain predictions, unique initiatives, and more. Book your ticket now to join us at AFA 2026!
For more onsite at Aviation Festival Asia 2025 see:
- The vision behind Air India Express’ route expansion
- Airline disruption: A $60b problem or a loyalty-building opportunity?
- Emerging stronger: What’s next for SriLankan Airlines?
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