MEET THE PEOPLE
2018 Summit Experts and their stories
Adam Schwab
Co-founder and CEO of Luxury Escapes
Adam Schwab is the cofounder and CEO of Luxury Escapes , one of Australia ’ s largest home grown pure play ecommerce business with more than 180 employees , operations in four continents and turnover of more than $ 350 million . From a standing start less than five years ago , more than 300,000 people take a Luxury Escape each year , while Luxury Escapes has one of the highest net promoter scores globally in any sector . Adam was originally a corporate lawyer specialising in mergers & acquisitions at HerbertSmithFreehills before becoming a founding director of privatelyowned corporate accommodation and services group , Living Corporate Apartments , before founding what would become Luxury Escapes with school friend , Jeremy Same . Luxury Escapes was named # 1 on the AFR Fast 100 Company list in 2013 and again in 2017 and # 1 in Deloitte ’ s Technology Fast 50 while Adam was the Young CEO of the Year in 2015 and was nominated for the EY Entrepreneur of the Year 2014 ( Southern Region ). In addition to Luxury Escapes , Adam has been a director of the Myeloma Foundation of Australia since 2010 , and has run two Melbourne Marathons completely barefoot to raise funds for the foundation . Since 2004 , Adam has been a financial journalist and business commentator specialising in corporate governance , economics and start-ups for BRW and Crikey and has appeared on Sky Business , Today Tonight and Channel Seven News nationally . In 2010 , Adam released the Amazon ( microeconomics ) bestseller , Pigs at the Trough : Lessons from Australia ’ s Decade of Corporate Greed , published by John Wiley & Sons .
Andrea Staines
Andrea Staines has been a professional Non-Executive Director for over a decade , and is currently on the boards of QIC , ASX-listed SeaLink Travel , Tourism Australia , UnitingCare Qld and NDIA ( the NDIS Agency ). She was formerly on the Boards of ASX 30 Aurizon , Australian Rail Track Corporation ( ARTC ), Gladstone Ports , North Queensland Airports , Allconnex Water and ASX-listed Early Learning Services ( now G8 ). Andrea ’ s community work includes the Australian Rural Leadership Foundation Board . Andrea is a former CEO of Australian Airlines ( mark II ), a Qantas subsidiary flying between Asia and Australia , which she co-launched . This makes her one of few female airline CEOs globally , past or present . During this time , she was also a member of the Qantas Group Executive Committee . Prior to this , Andrea was the first female General Manager of Revenue Management at Qantas , leading a 150-strong team employing operations research algorithms and human intervention to optimise Qantas revenue . Before joining Qantas , Andrea worked in various financial and strategy roles with American Airlines at their Dallas headquarters . Andrea has an MBA ( Distinction ) focusing on finance and strategy from the University of Michigan , a Bachelor of Economics from the University of Queensland , and completed high school on full scholarship at the United World College in Singapore . Andrea is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors ( AICD ) and a Member of Chief Executive Women ( CEW ). She is the mother of two university students whom she raised single-handedly during her eight years as an executive at Qantas Group , including CEO of Australian Airlines .
12 Better Revenue I Better Industry I APAC I www . revenuemanagement . com . au