High Flyer

Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao has made history by starting and running her own major commercial airline.

- Lan Anh Nguyen

While women have long participated in the 116-year-old aviation industry as pilots and even airline CEOs, Vietnam’s Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao has made history in this traditionally male-dominated business: she is the only woman to have started and run her own major commercial airline, Vietjet Aviation. As such, she epitomizes the values of the Power Businesswomen in this issue—entrepreneurs who defy stereotypes and break down barriers.

Her success with Vietjet has also made her very wealthy. She is Vietnam’s first self-made woman billionaire, with a net worth of $2.5 billion, and the wealthiest self-made woman in Southeast Asia. Now, she’s ordering up new jets to take advantage of a booming regional market for air travel and take Vietjet global. Whether she can pull it off will require overcoming Vietnam’s own aging infrastructure, a global pilot shortage and navigating Southeast Asia’s patchwork of aviation regulations.

Thao has already proven she can overcome barriers. Her airline, founded in 2007, is now bigger than flag carrier Vietnam Airlines as measured by passengers carried. She grew in part through audacious service, by dressing flight attendants in bikinis for flights to beach-holiday destinations. The stunt resulted in a fine from the government, but garnered worldwide free publicity for Vietjet and, most importantly, sold tickets.

From just a handful of domestic routes when it launched, Vietjet has slowly expanded to 80 aircraft servicing 120 destinations. “Our strategy is to expand to any regional market within a radius of 2,500 kilometers,” she says, “so we can create bases that cover half of the world population.”