Neal Cohen

Neal Cohen is Co-Leader of the global Aviation practice. Mr. Cohen specializes in leading public and private companies, including those in the aviation, manufacturing, and services industries. With more than 30 years of experience, he partners with boards and executive teams to achieve exceptional performance, realize sustained growth and position themselves as industry leaders.

Mr. Cohen has expertise in the airline, aerospace, automotive, and education industries serving various roles in strategy, marketing, finance and operations. He brings a corporate background with experience as an executive on multiple restructurings, transformations and transactions. Mr. Cohen’s experience includes restructuring, business plan development, strategic planning, financial process optimization, revenue enhancement, cost reduction, cash flow improvement, balance sheet management, debt, equity and other financings, working in a regulated environment across many stakeholders, and merger and carve out execution. In addition, Mr. Cohen has also acted as interim management.

Prior to FTI Consulting, Mr. Cohen provided consulting to Avianca Airlines, where he served as the Chief Transformation Advisor, developing and implementing a comprehensive strategic, financial and operating plan to drive $500 million in annual profit improvement. Prior to that, Mr. Cohen has held executive positions at ATK, Northwest Airlines, and US Airways.

During his tenure at Northwest, Mr. Cohen led restructuring of the $12 billion airline, improving annual results $3 billion by refocusing on core activities, improving revenue and cost performance and raising $1.0 billion in new equity. Mr. Cohen also helped lead the strategic assessment and Delta-Northwest merger. While at US Airways, he led the post-9/11 restructuring, driving $1.5 billion in annual improvements and $1.0+ billion capital raise -- eventually leading to the company’s merger with America West (now American Airlines).

While an airline industry executive, Mr. Cohen held positions in many key areas, including strategy, network and fleet planning, international and revenue management, alliances, cargo, regionals, and finance, including CFO.

Mr. Cohen started his career at General Motors NY Treasurer’s Office, where he supported the restructuring of GM international operations, as well as rationalization of $2 billion of non-core assets.