Shai Weiss has joined the board of directors of Navan, strengthening the company’s leadership with deep airline and travel industry expertise.
Navan, which operates across business travel booking, payments and expense management, said Weiss’s appointment will support its next phase of growth as it continues to scale in the global travel and expense market.
Ariel Cohen, chief executive officer and co-founder of Navan, said Weiss brings a strong understanding of the business traveller’s needs. “Shai is a travel industry veteran with a deep appreciation of the traveller mindset,” Cohen said. “Under his leadership, Virgin Atlantic evolved into a premium, digital-first airline with industry-leading guest satisfaction. As we continue to grow, his experience will help us further disrupt the $185 billion travel and expense market.”
Weiss said he was honoured to join the board and praised Navan’s traveller-first approach. “Navan’s commitment to putting the traveller at the centre, powered by world-class technology, is exactly what businesses need today,” he said. “It’s a true industry disruptor, with the vision to build its technology stack from the ground up in service of its customers.”
Weiss served as chief executive officer of Virgin Atlantic from January 2019 until December 2025, having previously joined the airline as chief financial officer in 2014 before later becoming chief commercial officer. He was also an executive director on Virgin Atlantic’s board from 2014.
During his tenure, Weiss played a key role in shaping the airline’s ownership and partnerships, including facilitating Delta Air Lines’ acquisition of Singapore Airlines’ 49 per cent stake in Virgin Atlantic. He also helped establish a $17 billion transatlantic joint venture with Delta and Air France-KLM, with Virgin Atlantic as a founding member.
Before joining the Virgin Group in 2006, Weiss held senior management roles at ntl:Telewest, now Virgin Media O2, and earlier worked in the technology investment banking team at Morgan Stanley in London.
At Navan, Weiss joins an existing board that includes Ben Horowitz, Arif Janmohamed, Mike Kourey, Clara Liang, Sandesh Patnam, Anré Williams and Oren Zeev, alongside co-founders Ariel Cohen and Ilan Twig.
His appointment underscores Navan’s ambition to blend deep travel industry insight with technology-led innovation as corporate travel continues to evolve.