Willie Walsh is departing IAG after 15 years as CEO.
Willie Walsh, the chief executive officer of International Airlines Group, has announced he is to step down.
The 58-year-old will retire as chief executive and from the board of IAG on 30 June, ending a 15-year career.
He famously oversaw the creation of IAG with the merger of British Airways and Iberia in 2010.
IAG then bought out the Irish government’s stake in Aer Lingus in 2015 with Walsh spearheading the successful approach and earning himself a reputation for hard-nosed negotiating.
“It has been a privilege to have been instrumental in the creation and development of IAG. I have had the pleasure of working with many exceptional people over the past 15 years at British Airways and at IAG,” Walsh said.
In recent years, however, BA has been hit by a series of problems, including a major hack that led to hundreds of thousands of customer credit card details being stolen.
In 2017, a severe systems failure resulted in hundreds of flights being cancelled and in 2019, for the first time in BA’s 100-year history, pilots went on strike in a long-running pay dispute, leading to the grounding of 2,325 flights.
British Airways has also faced criticism over the last few years about the falling quality of its service and staff.
Luis Gallego, the current chief executive of Iberia, is set to take over the role of CEO of IAG.
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