‘It showed how things could change. I was a which recently signed a regional flights deal person from a working-class background with Aer Lingus. ‘There was a dynamic in Tallaght whose parents had never management team,’ Joyce recalled. It even set foot in the college, and was the perfect grounding for what they’re celebrating their son getting a masters degree.’ Joyce said his MSc thesis supervisor Professor Antony Standing up and talking to lay ahead. A pincer movement Unwin, then in Trinity’s Statistics Department, was an inspiration. He exposed him to public speaking - by students gave me confidence In 1996 Joyce moved to Australia to become head of network planning with Ansett Australia. He said one of asking Joyce to give lectures in computer the reasons he left was homosexuality was statistical methods in Trinity - and finance still not fully accepted in Ireland, after being - by helping him gain work experience in Dublin legalised only three years earlier. ‘Australia seemed stockbrokers NCB. ‘Standing up and talking to students more open, more accepting so that was one of the reasons gave me confidence, as did on the dealing room floor in I made the move.’ the stock market,’ he recalled. Joyce did his masters in operations research using mathematical models to solve industry problems. To this day, he said, he draws upon this learning when making hard decisions. Joyce did well there and got noticed by Rod Eddington, a grandee of Australian business who went on to become chief executive of British Airways. Eddington mentioned him to Geoff Dixon, the boss of Qantas, as a rising star, Taking off Joyce left education with no interest in aviation but he applied for a job as an operations researcher with Aer Lingus anyway. ‘Airlines usually have complex systems, and involve complex business decisions so I felt it would be a good experience.’ Joyce found the then semi-state to be a dynamic place to work. Legendary entrepreneur Tony Ryan had worked there before he became the pioneer of aviation leasing. When Joyce entered Aer Lingus he found himself surrounded by talent. Willie Walsh, who would go on to lead Aer Lingus and later the world’s biggest airline IAG, was there. His boss was Colm McCarthy, who would go on to launch Air Asia and run Emerald Airlines, and he poached him just a year before Ansett collapsed. Qantas was state-owned but entrepreneurial. ‘It was unbelievably dynamic and aggressive,’ Joyce recalled. After Ansett fell apart, Joyce proved his mettle to Dixon by filling the gap that was left with Qantas planes. Dixon felt confident enough to ask Joyce, only in his early 30s, to help Qantas set up a low-cost carrier called Jetstar to fight off Virgin Blue, a rival low fares airline backed by Richard Branson. ‘Geoff said we need to figure out how to stop what’s happened in Europe, and what’s happened in North America where low-cost carriers were eating the lunch of full-service carriers,’ he explained. Joyce led the team that developed Jetstar and launched it on 29 February, 2004. ‘It became this amazing success,’ Joyce
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