The digital and legal appointments announced on 18 August complete a set. People, finance, digital and legal, four of nine Executive Board functions, have a new holder named in 2026. The chief executive, operating, revenue, customer and communications seats have not moved. The rebuild is running from the strongest quarter Finnair has reported, and from a general meeting that rejected the company's pay report with 90 percent of the votes represented against it.
Finnair appointed Arti Zeighami, 55, as Chief Digital Officer from 19 August 2026, and Kaarina Ståhlberg, 59, as Senior Vice President and General Counsel from 31 August 2026. Both join the Executive Board and report to CEO Turkka Kuusisto. Zeighami succeeds Antti Kleemola, who supports the handover until the end of September. Ståhlberg succeeds Sami Sarelius, who continues as an executive advisor to Finnair until the end of the year.
The two profiles do not overlap, and neither comes from aviation. Zeighami was most recently Partner and Director at Boston Consulting Group working on the scaling of artificial intelligence, and before that Chief Data and Analytics Officer at H&M Group.
Ståhlberg holds a Master of Laws, was Assistant General Counsel at Nokia and General Counsel at both Posti Group and Fortum, and sits on the boards of Finnish listed companies like Aspo, Finnair, Fiskars group, Vincit.
Four of nine functions changed. None of them touch daily commercial execution.
Finnair discloses a nine-member Executive Board covering products and customers, revenue, operations, digital services, finance and strategy, people and culture, communications, and legal affairs. Four of those have a new holder named this year.
Two of the four are already in the job. Sini Kivekäs became Chief People Officer and joined the Executive Board on 2 June, the day Kaisa Aalto-Luoto left it, four months after Finnair disclosed the departure on 19 January.
Ståhlberg starts in legal on 31 August. Finance follows on 1 November, when Jussi Siitonen becomes Chief Financial Officer in place of Pia Aaltonen-Forsell, who is leaving for the same role at Valmet.
The finance change carried a governance step. Siitonen was re-elected to the Board of Directors on 24 March and resigned from it on 24 July, the day his appointment was announced. Crossing from a non-executive seat to an executive one requires exactly that, and the board consequently runs with seven of the eight directors elected in March until the next general meeting.
The rebuild is being done from a record quarter, not a bad one
Second-quarter revenue was EUR 916.7 million, up 16.4 percent from EUR 787.7 million. The comparable operating result was EUR 78.4 million against EUR 10.3 million a year earlier, and passenger numbers rose 7.6 percent to 3.314 million.
Across the half year, revenue reached EUR 1,694.8 million from EUR 1,481.9 million, and the comparable operating result turned to EUR 77.8 million from a loss of EUR 52.3 million. The first quarter had already improved, with revenue up 12.1 percent to EUR 778.1 million and a comparable operating result of EUR -0.6 million.
Finnair raised its 2026 outlook on 22 July to revenue of EUR 3.4 to 3.5 billion and a comparable operating result of EUR 120 to 190 million, assuming no material disruption to fuel availability. Kuusisto called the quarterly figure "a record-high 78.4 million euros", which is the company's characterisation of its own result. July passenger volume rose 9.3 percent year on year.
Enabling functions are often rebuilt after a shock. These are being rebuilt while the numbers improve.
The board survived the March general meeting intact. The pay report did not
The shareholders' nomination board proposed an unchanged board on 15 January, and the meeting on 24 March re-elected all eight directors, with Sanna Suvanto-Harsaae as chair and Mika Ihamuotila as vice chair. The 2025 accounts were adopted.
The remuneration report was rejected. Of the 140,441,158 shares and votes represented at the meeting, 126,215,985 were cast against approving it, approximately 94 percent of the votes cast in advance voting and approximately 90 percent of those represented. The minutes record that the resolution was advisory, that the rejection does not oblige Finnair to prepare a new report, and that it does not affect remuneration decisions already made. Rejections at this scale are uncommon in Finland.
Three dates decide whether the rebuild reads as strength
The third-quarter report in October is the first with the digital seat filled. The finance handover lands on 1 November. The 2027 nomination board proposal, due in January, is the first read on whether shareholders who rejected the pay report intend to press further. Whether four function changes in eight months speed execution or slow it remains an open question.
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The digital and legal appointments announced on 18 August complete a set. People, finance, digital and legal, four of nine Executive Board functions, have a new holder named in 2026. The chief executive, operating, revenue, customer and communications seats have not moved. The rebuild is running from the strongest quarter Finnair has reported, and from a general meeting that rejected the company's pay report with 90 percent of the votes represented against it.
Finnair appointed Arti Zeighami, 55, as Chief Digital Officer from 19 August 2026, and Kaarina Ståhlberg, 59, as Senior Vice President and General Counsel from 31 August 2026. Both join the Executive Board and report to CEO Turkka Kuusisto. Zeighami succeeds Antti Kleemola, who supports the handover until the end of September. Ståhlberg succeeds Sami Sarelius, who continues as an executive advisor to Finnair until the end of the year.
The two profiles do not overlap, and neither comes from aviation. Zeighami was most recently Partner and Director at Boston Consulting Group working on the scaling of artificial intelligence, and before that Chief Data and Analytics Officer at H&M Group.
Ståhlberg holds a Master of Laws, was Assistant General Counsel at Nokia and General Counsel at both Posti Group and Fortum, and sits on the boards of Finnish listed companies like Aspo, Finnair, Fiskars group, Vincit.
Four of nine functions changed. None of them touch daily commercial execution.
Finnair discloses a nine-member Executive Board covering products and customers, revenue, operations, digital services, finance and strategy, people and culture, communications, and legal affairs. Four of those have a new holder named this year.
Two of the four are already in the job. Sini Kivekäs became Chief People Officer and joined the Executive Board on 2 June, the day Kaisa Aalto-Luoto left it, four months after Finnair disclosed the departure on 19 January.
Ståhlberg starts in legal on 31 August. Finance follows on 1 November, when Jussi Siitonen becomes Chief Financial Officer in place of Pia Aaltonen-Forsell, who is leaving for the same role at Valmet.
The finance change carried a governance step. Siitonen was re-elected to the Board of Directors on 24 March and resigned from it on 24 July, the day his appointment was announced. Crossing from a non-executive seat to an executive one requires exactly that, and the board consequently runs with seven of the eight directors elected in March until the next general meeting.
The rebuild is being done from a record quarter, not a bad one
Second-quarter revenue was EUR 916.7 million, up 16.4 percent from EUR 787.7 million. The comparable operating result was EUR 78.4 million against EUR 10.3 million a year earlier, and passenger numbers rose 7.6 percent to 3.314 million.
Across the half year, revenue reached EUR 1,694.8 million from EUR 1,481.9 million, and the comparable operating result turned to EUR 77.8 million from a loss of EUR 52.3 million. The first quarter had already improved, with revenue up 12.1 percent to EUR 778.1 million and a comparable operating result of EUR -0.6 million.
Finnair raised its 2026 outlook on 22 July to revenue of EUR 3.4 to 3.5 billion and a comparable operating result of EUR 120 to 190 million, assuming no material disruption to fuel availability. Kuusisto called the quarterly figure "a record-high 78.4 million euros", which is the company's characterisation of its own result. July passenger volume rose 9.3 percent year on year.
Enabling functions are often rebuilt after a shock. These are being rebuilt while the numbers improve.
The board survived the March general meeting intact. The pay report did not
The shareholders' nomination board proposed an unchanged board on 15 January, and the meeting on 24 March re-elected all eight directors, with Sanna Suvanto-Harsaae as chair and Mika Ihamuotila as vice chair. The 2025 accounts were adopted.
The remuneration report was rejected. Of the 140,441,158 shares and votes represented at the meeting, 126,215,985 were cast against approving it, approximately 94 percent of the votes cast in advance voting and approximately 90 percent of those represented. The minutes record that the resolution was advisory, that the rejection does not oblige Finnair to prepare a new report, and that it does not affect remuneration decisions already made. Rejections at this scale are uncommon in Finland.
Three dates decide whether the rebuild reads as strength
The third-quarter report in October is the first with the digital seat filled. The finance handover lands on 1 November. The 2027 nomination board proposal, due in January, is the first read on whether shareholders who rejected the pay report intend to press further. Whether four function changes in eight months speed execution or slow it remains an open question.
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