Two senior Qantas executives – Rob Gurney and Bruce Buchanan – will leave the airline in the latest stage of its five year “transformation plan”.
A restructure of the airline will see it split into two distinct businesses, Qantas International and Qantas Domestic with separate chief executives and operational and commercial functions.
Financial results will also be reported separately.
The new structure will be effective from July 1, the first day of the 2012/13 financial year. The current boss of the frequent flyer program, Simon Hickey, will step up to chief executive of Qantas International with Lyell Strambi, group executive of operations, to head up the domestic airline.
The shake-up will see Jetstar Group chief executive Bruce Buchanan leave after nine years with Qantas. He will remain with Jetstar for six months and provide consultancy work for a further 18 months.
Jayne Hrdlicka, group executive strategy and technology, will take over at Jetstar.
Rob Gurney, another long serving and high profile executive, will also leave. The Qantas Airlines group executive commercial and freight has decided it was “appropriate to leave the group”, Qantas said in a statement.
Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce said the split into two businesses recognises that “Qantas Group is a true portfolio business”.
“Formally separating the management of Qantas Domestic and Qantas International will ensure we can independently run each business according to its specific priorities and market conditions,” Joyce said. “[They] face very different situations.”
He said its domestic business is “strong and profitable” with the highest level of customer satisfaction since 2004. In comments certain to rile Virgin Australia, Joyce added that Qantas remained “the airline of choice for corporate Australia”.
The process of turning the international business to a “sustainable position”, was underway, he said.
