The Launch Generation
Two aircraft wet-leased from Pakistan International Airlines, a five-month deadline, and the decision to compete without protection at its own airport.
Emirates Alumni
A private network for the people who built Emirates and dnata — to find each other again, to put on the record how the hub was actually made to work, and to be reachable by whoever tries to build something like it next.
Why now
Emirates was started by a very small number of people, and most of them can still be named. Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum has been chairman since 1985 — an unbroken forty-one years, which is close to unheard of in any large institution. Maurice Flanagan, who was handed a five-month deadline and ten million dollars in March 1985 and built the airline inside it, died in London in May 2015. Tim Clark joined at launch as head of airline planning, has been president of the airline since 2003, and as of August 2026 no successor has been publicly named.
The airline publishes its fleet, its routes and its results every year. It publishes almost nothing about method: how the network was planned when there was no traffic to plan against, why the 777 was ordered in 1992 and the A380 in 2000, what was actually argued about before a screen went into every seat in 1992, what it took to restart an airline that had stopped completely in March 2020. That judgement sits in a few dozen heads, most of them now at or past retirement, and it exists in no other form.
Four generations
This is not only for the class of 1985. Every era solved a problem the next one inherited.
Two aircraft wet-leased from Pakistan International Airlines, a five-month deadline, and the decision to compete without protection at its own airport.
The record orders, Terminal 3, the cabin product, and the network that turned Dubai into a connecting machine.
The largest A380 and Boeing 777 fleets in the world, the Qantas alliance, and the open-skies fight with the US majors.
The grounding of March 2020, the recapitalisation, the retrofit programme, and four record years.
dnata has its own and older lineage. It was founded in Dubai in 1959 as the Dubai National Air Travel Agency with five employees, and by the mid-1980s it was handling sales for 26 airlines — the organisation out of which Emirates was created. dnata people belong in this community on the same terms.
The expertise we are assembling
An airline is not one discipline. Tell us which of these you worked in, and for how long — that is the whole of the first form.
Crew, training, standards and the running of a round-the-clock long-haul operation.
Line and base maintenance, the engineering centres, and the cabin retrofit programme.
Route selection, schedule design, and the aircraft orders the network was built around.
The hub itself — turnarounds, connections, baggage, and dnata's ground handling.
Cabin interiors, inflight entertainment and connectivity, catering and onboard service.
Sales, revenue optimisation, distribution, loyalty and the country-by-country commercial build.
Emirates SkyCargo, freighters, the cargo terminal, and the logistics business around it.
Finance, aeropolitical and regulatory affairs, procurement, and the running of the group.
Six ways to take part
Most members start with one and add another later. None of them requires you to be looking for anything.
Add your name, your period and your function to the founding directory.
One profile. Thirty minutes.Record one interview about something you built or lived through.
One hour, once.Take occasional paid advisory calls in your area of expertise.
You set the availability.Join an assembled team on a commissioned build.
By mandate, when it suits you.Guide someone earlier in the career you already had.
A few hours a quarter.Name the people who must be in this network, and open the door.
Introductions only.What we promise you
This is the part that matters most, and it is not negotiable.
What we are asking for
Join the founding directory: your period, your function, what you built. Thirty minutes.
Sit for one recorded conversation about something you made happen. It becomes part of the archive.
Name three people who must be in this network — and, if you can, make the introduction.
The founding directory
Members who asked to be listed publicly. Everyone else is here too, privately.
No names yet. The first will appear here as members are approved.
Add your name
Five questions, about ten minutes. Nothing you write here is published — it goes to the directory, private by default.
Emirates Alumni is an independent initiative created by former colleagues. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or a property of Emirates or the Emirates Group. The Emirates name is used here only to describe who this community is for. If the airline chooses to support the project, that relationship will be stated openly on this page.
If you helped build any of this, you belong here — and so do the people you worked with. Please pass the link on.