New roles for the industry’s movers and shakers
Thomas Cook
Thomas Cook recently announced new roles and additional portfolios for its senior management team. Mahesh Iyer has been appointed as the chief operating officer. Iyer has contributed to the foreign exchange business across functions of operations, products, projects, airports and commercial, and the visa and passport vertical. Prior to his new role, Iyer was responsible for the overall strategies for the company, in addition to its foreign exchange business.
Rajeev D Kale has been appointed as president and country head – leisure travel, MICE. Kale joined the group in 2007 as head of MICE. He has played a pioneering role in setting up MICE operations for the organisation.
Other major appointments include Abraham Alapatt as president and group head – marketing, service quality, financial services and innovation; Amit Madhan as president and group head – technology and shared services; Rambhau Kenkare as president and group head – legal, secretarial and administration; Mona Cheriyan as president and group head – human resources; and Indiver Rastogi as president and country head – corporate travel.
Tourism Malaysia, Mumbai
Mohammad Hafiz Hashim recently took over as the director, Tourism Malaysia, Mumbai. Malaysia is expected to attract one million Indian tourists this year and Hashim’s main responsibilities include developing Western India market, targeting especially the Tier II and Tier III towns to reach these numbers. Hashim is also planning to promote niche products like self-drive, luxury travel, eco-tourism, sports tourism, business travel etc to reach out to special interest segments of the Indian traveller. In his earlier roles, Hashim has served at Tourism Malaysia offices in Singapore, Sydney, Melbourne and Auckland.
Yatra.com
Yatra.com has announced the appointment of Vikrant Mudaliar as the chief marketing officer of the company. He will be responsible for leading marketing activities across all Yatra.com business lines and group entities. While focusing on strengthening Yatra’s brand equity in the travel category, he will be responsible for driving the marketing and communications strategy to support the company’s overall strategic objectives. Mudaliar brings with him over 17 years of experience and has handled leadership roles across business management, marketing, sales and strategy functions. He previously served as chief sales and marketing Officer at Lenskart.com.
Expedia
Simon Fiquet has been appointed as general manager, Expedia for South East Asia and India. In his new role, Fiquet will be responsible for growing Expedia’s business across seven point of sales. Fiquet will manage the operations, introduction of new products and the overall business results for Expedia. With over four years in Singapore, Fiquet headed the online travel team at Google Singapore.
Carlson Wagonlit Travel
Carlson Wagonlit Travel (CWT) has appointed Kurt Ekert as president and CEO, replacing Douglas Anderson. In his new role, Ekert will report directly to the Carlson board of directors. Ekert most recently served as executive vice president and chief commercial officer of Travelport.
SilkAir
SilkAir has appointed Foo Chai Woo as its chief executive. Chai Woo will assume his new position with effect from May 18, 2016. He has been SIA’s divisional vice president, sales and marketing since May 2014. An SIA veteran with nearly 21 years of service, he has held positions in both head office as well as overseas. Before taking on his current role in sales and marketing, he was based in Los Angeles since November 2010 as SIA’s regional vice president, Americas.
Bombardier Business Aircraft
Bombardier Business Aircraft has created a dedicated, worldwide sales team for its Learjet 70 and Learjet 75 aircraft. Mike Fahey will assume overall responsibility and accountability for the Learjet programme worldwide as vice president – Learjet Aircraft Sales. Fahney began his career in 1981 as sales director for South East Asia and was assigned positions of increasing responsibility over the years. Bombardier’s pre-owned aircraft sales activities will now be led by Peter Bromby, newly appointed regional vice president, pre-owned aircraft. Bromby has over 20 years of experience in the industry.
IATA
International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) board of governors has unanimously approved to recommend Alexandre de Juniac, chairman and CEO of Air France-KLM, to succeed retiring director general and CEO, Tony Tyler. With confirmation by the IATA annual general meeting to be held June 1-3, 2016 in Dublin, Ireland, de Juniac will take up duties as the head of the association after a short handover period. de Juniac been serving as chairman and CEO, Air France-KLM since 2013. Prior to that, he was the chairman and CEO of Air France. From 1995 to 2009, de Juniac held various leadership positions in Thales, the French aerospace, defense and transport company previously known as Thomson-CSF.
Delta Air Lines
Delta Air Lines has appointed Henry Kuykendall as vice president – New York, and has promoted Chuck Imhof to vice President – New York, sales. Since 2011, Kuykendall has served as Delta’s vice president – airport customer service at New York’s JFK International Airport. Whereas, Imhof joined Delta in 2009 as head of the airline’s New York sales team.
Grand Hyatt, Taipei
Sammy Carolus has been appointed as general manager of Grand Hyatt Taipei. He was previously the general manager of the Hyatt Regency Hua Hin and The Barai in Thailand. Carolus has relocated to Taipei with more than 20 years of experience in the hospitality industry. He started as a sales executive with Hyatt Bali in 1992 and later served as associate director of business development and director of business development at Grand Hyatt Bali. In 2003, Carolus became director of marketing for Hyatt Regency Hua Hin.