Welcome to Today in Business - Powered by Spark for Business, an experimental AI podcast by the New Zealand Herald. Each weekday, we bring you five stories, the best of the New Zealand Herald business journalism, summarised and delivered by an AI voice as an easily digestible recap. It is Wednesday, July 30, 2025, and here are five stories you should know about. Air New Zealand has appointed Nikhil Ravishankar as its next chief executive, effective October 20. Ravishankar currently serves as the company's chief digital officer and has been with Air New Zealand for nearly five years. He will succeed Greg Foran, who announced his departure earlier this year. Ravishankar previously worked at Vector and Accenture. Board chair Dame Therese Walsh says the board conducted an extensive international search and was impressed by Ravishankar's leadership and digital expertise. Ravishankar says he is "thrilled and humbled" to lead the company. This is the second time Air New Zealand's tech chief becomes CEO. In other news, Kiwibank's parent Kiwi Group Holdings has received government approval to raise up to $500 million in capital from large New Zealand investors. The funds would help Kiwibank expand its lending capacity, with Finance Minister Nicola Willis saying the move could support up to $4 billion in business lending or $10 billion in home loans. The capital raise process will include negotiations with KiwiSaver funds and investment institutions, with government ownership remaining above 51%. Kiwibank CEO Steve Jurkovich says there will be no return of capital to the Crown and no changes for customers. Moving to markets, shares in Synlait Milk dropped 9.2% after the dairy company reported manufacturing challenges at its Dunsandel facility. Synlait says these issues have been resolved and expects a significant improvement in underlying earnings for the current year. The company now forecasts a net loss of $27 million to $40 million for 2025, down from $182.1 million in 2024. Synlait's underlying EBITDA is expected to reach $100-110 million, compared with $45.2 million last year. Newly appointed CEO Richard Wyeth says Synlait's recovery is on track, with all banking covenants met. Meanwhile, Boeing has reported a smaller second-quarter loss of US$697 million as it delivered more planes, boosting revenue to US$22.7 billion. This marks the company's highest number of second-quarter deliveries since 2018. Boeing delivered 150 aircraft during the quarter and increased 737 MAX production to 38 per month. CEO Kelly Ortberg says progress is being made but more work is needed. Boeing's backlog now stands at over US$618 billion. The company resumed deliveries to Chinese carriers and won new US defence contracts. Shares in Boeing fell 3.7% in afternoon trading after the earnings release. Also today, Paper Plus New Zealand has returned to profit, reporting a $218,000 net profit for the year ended March 31, 2025, after raising $700,000 in new shareholder capital. Revenue was steady at $10.89 million, with operating profit at $299,000. The company renegotiated its borrowing facilities with BNZ, securing a $1.75 million reducing loan and a $750,000 overdraft. Paper Plus currently operates 88 stores nationwide and has 57 shareholders listed. The company said the capital raise and loan adjustments provide enough financial headroom, and the board was confident in the company's ongoing viability. That was Today in Business - Powered by Spark for Business - your NZ Herald daily business summary. For the best in business, subscribe to Herald Premium at nzherald.co.nz.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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