Singapore Airlines announces senior management reshuffle, Scoot CEO promoted
SINGAPORE – The chief executive of Singapore Airlines’ (SIA) low-cost arm Scoot will return to its parent carrier, as the airline announced a reshuffle of top posts in a move seen as paving the way for its next generation of leaders.
In a bourse filing on Monday (Feb 17), SIA said Mr Lee Lik Hsin, 49, who is currently CEO at Scoot, will be promoted and return to SIA as executive vice-president (commercial).
He will oversee the cargo, customer experience, marketing planning, as well as the sales and marketing divisions. Mr Lee will also be responsible for the sales regions.
Mr Tan Kai Ping, 47, senior vice-president (marketing planning), will be promoted to executive vice-president (finance and strategy), where he will oversee the corporate planning and finance divisions.
Executive vice-president (commercial) Mak Swee Wah, 59, will assume the position of executive vice-president (operations), where he will be responsible for SIA’s cabin crew, customer services and operations, engineering, and flight operations divisions.
Mr Lee, Mr Tan and Mr Mak will report directly to SIA chief executive Goh Choon Phong, 56.
The Straits Times understands that Mr Lee and Mr Tan now look to be the two who are in the running to eventually succeed Mr Goh as SIA’s CEO.
SIA’s senior vice-president (sales and marketing) Campbell Wilson, 48 will return to helm the airline’s fully-owned subsidiary Scoot, which he led till its merger with Tigerair.
These changes take effect from April 1.
“The SIA Group has highly capable executives with deep organisational and industry expertise, who are able to step up and take on new responsibilities,” Mr Goh said.
“With these appointments, we have further strengthened our management team and better positioned the group for the future.”
SIA’s executive vice-president (human resources and operations) Ng Chin Hwee, 59, will take early retirement from the group on March 31 and join SIA Engineering Company as its CEO on April 1.
Mr Ng is taking over from Mr Png Kim Chiang, who is retiring from his position as CEO and will relinquish his directorship at SIA Engineering on April 1, while continuing as an advisor in the company.
The national carrier reported a 10.9 per cent increase in net profit for the third quarter to $315 million from $284 million a year ago on Feb 14.
This was on the back of a better performance by associates and joint ventures, SIA said.
Group revenue for the quarter also rose 3 per cent to a record high of $4.5 billion, driven by initiatives from its three-year transformation plan yielding results as well as strong growth in passenger revenue, which grew 7 per cent due to robust traffic growth.
Expenditure for the group was up 1.7 per cent or $68 million to $4.0 billion, as a result of higher non-fuel expenditure.
Operating performance across the group’s companies remained stable, with improved performance from the parent airline and Scoot.
The parent airline company’s operating profit rose 11.9 per cent to $413 million year on year due to growth in passenger revenue, while higher passenger traffic saw Scoot saw it pull in an operating profit of $4 million, $3 million higher than a year ago.
SIA Engineering’s operating profit stood at $16 million year on year and recorded a 1.5 per cent decline in revenue, due to reduction in airframe and line maintenance revenue.
The group reported an earnings per share of 26.6 Singapore cents, compared with 24 cents a year ago. No dividend was declared for the period.