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Insolvency is a cruel, hard fact of business life, something no one wants to contemplate,

but something that can never be ruled out. In 2024, in fact, it happened to just under

25,000 UK companies. It's only half of 1% of all the firms registered, but it's a half of 1%

you definitely don't want to be a part of. But sometimes an insolvency can open a path to success.

Take the great Henry Ford, for example. He went bankrupt with his first business, the Detroit

automobile company. But he demonstrated resilience and self-belief. He went off. For example, he went bankrupt with his first business, the Detroit Automobile Company.

But he demonstrated resilience and self-belief.

He went on to establish the Ford Motor Company in 1903, launched the Model T,

revolutionized the car industry and arguably changed the world forever.

So while going insolvent must be incredibly difficult experience, laying

off workers, dealing with debt, facing uncertainty, it can sometimes become an opportunity.

Now, I'm Evan Davis, and in this episode of the decisions that made me, the series of business

interviews brought to you by the team behind the bottom line, we're going to hear about one such story.

Alan French was the group strategy and technology director at Thomas Cook when the largely

High Street, 178-year-old travel company collapsed in 2019. With a small group of colleagues,

Alan wrote an investment plan to revive Thomas Cook as a digital-only brand,

launching in 2020 with Alan as the chief executive and a team of remote working employees.

The operation is now completely online.

The website lets you book your package holiday yourself, choosing your own flights and hotels.

The company works with a range of airlines as it no longer owns the planes. In this episode, I'm going to find out how Alan was

part of the management team that precipitated an insolvency and what he decided to do after that.

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