AirAsia Philippines CFO Ray Berja highlights resilience and agility as key drivers for post pandemic recovery at Global CFO Forum

MANILA, 29 June 2021 – The importance for businesses to effectively infuse digitalization, collaboration and open communication to steer towards profitability post pandemic was a key focus of AirAsia Philippines’ Chief Financial Officer Raymund Berja as he shared learnings and valuable insights at the 2021 Global CFO forum as a keynote speaker along with other world renowned CFO’s.

More than 300 attendees from Asia Pacific, Middle East, USA and Europe participated in the virtual conference with the theme, “Transforming the toughest CFO challenges into valuable business resilience.” 
The annual conference aims to future-proof CFOs  and finance leaders in transforming the finance function with practical and strategic guidance on process and people to accelerate rapid growth towards a financially-viable business model via corporate-driven best practices.

AirAsia Philippines CFO Ray Berja said, “Our present situation can be likened to a ball--- the harder it hits the ground, the stronger it rebounds. But this can only be successful if there’s collaboration among members of the team. Having said that, a CFO cannot survive the pandemic alone. He needs a talented team who are also committed not only to drive cost efficient measures but also to implement work productivity and maximization of resources.” 

“Taking part in the 2021 Global CFO Forum as the only Filipino speaker was both a humbling and enriching experience especially for us in the airline industry. With the passengers' appetite to travel again, and the inoculation program set to achieve herd immunity hopefully by Christmas time for NCR plus 8, the future looks bright.”

“For now, we at AirAsia will remain optimistic to hit where the demand is and continuously evolve through our various efforts of digital transformation. All these as we want our guests to experience safe, hassle free and convenient travel through our various digital platforms,” Beja added.

Other top-brass speakers in the forum include, Hussain Al Balushi, Group Chief Financial Officer and Board Member Oman Aviation Group, Mohamed Isa , award-winning speaker and 4-time amazon’s bestselling author from Bahrain and Martin Bradley, CFO Dulsco Dubai.

Berja is a recipient of the 2019 Global CFO Excellence Award and 2019 Aviation CFO of the Year.