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Spirit Airlines announced today that it has appointed Dave Davis as President and Chief Executive Officer. Davis joins Spirit from Sun Country Airlines where he served as President and Chief Financial Officer. As the airline plots its course on the other side of bankruptcy, it will take strong leadership to reinvent the airline and move it forward.
Ted Christie, President and Chief Executive Officer, stepped down from the CEO role last week. He had been with the low-cost carrier for 13 years. Davis seems like a great fit to take the reins. He has held a number of senior roles in the airline industry. Aside from being CFO for Sun Country, he held the same role at Northwest Airlines before it was acquired by Delta Air Lines.
Spirit announced last month that it had exited Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and was moving forward after only four months of restructuring. Under its plan, the company went private (meaning no more stock), $795 million in debt was wiped out, and $350 million in new money was pumped into the company. Spirit is still figuring out how to make itself competitive with the slew of changes to the passenger experience that it has announced over the past year.
In addition to Davis’ appointment, Spirit is bringing in other industry veterans to help with the revitalization. Trey Urbahn, a former JetBlue and TAP Air Portugal executive who has also been a member of the board of Breeze Airways, will serve as Senior Commercial Advisor to oversee network, pricing and yield management, as well as the airline’s onboard configurations and offerings. Duncan Dee, a former chief operating officer at Air Canada, is joining as Senior Vice President, Corporate Communications, with responsibility for all aspects of the internal and external communications of the airline.
Anthony’s Take: These changes make sense and will put capable people in the seats to effect the change that Spirit needs to find its way while fending off acquisition attempts from rivals like Frontier. I’ve long been a fan of Spirit Airlines and wish this new team well.
(Image Credits: Spirit Airlines.)
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Advertiser & Editorial Disclosure: The Bulkhead Seat earns an affiliate commission for anyone approved through the links above This compensation may impact how and where links appear on this site. We work to provide the best publicly available offers to our readers. We frequently update them, but this site does not include all available offers. Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed, or approved by any of these entities.
